Pretty much everyone, whether they’re on foot, on a bike or in a car
waves a greeting and it’s pretty easy to get in the habit of waving back
helmets and the fit wasn’t ideal. We’re both
fans of ‘all the gear, all the time’ so whilst New
Cal weather would make riding without gear
very comfortable, that’s not the way we roll.
Our first day took us out of Nouméa on the
RT1 and up the west coast through La Tontouta,
which is where the international airport is, and
then to La Foa, Bourail and our first stop at
Kone some 275km north of the capital city.
These roads were a good intro to New Cal
driving conditions (and driving on the right side
of the road which is something neither of us
had done for a few years) and the more arid
western side of the island. We were there in
early November which is the back end of the
dry season and the landscape was a bit parched
in places. There’s not much in the way of local
wildlife to be aware of on the roads, although
it pays to ease off if you see a cow or horse at
the side of the road as, whilst most of them
are tethered, we did see one or two that were
roaming free, but appeared to understand
the road rules and stayed out of trouble.
Most of the roads are wonderfully free
of plastic and paper litter but you’ll see
plenty of dumped and wrecked cars along
the verge. Whether they were abandoned
after crashes, breakdowns or just random
dumping isn’t clear but it does seem that
car recovery isn’t high on the agenda.
Rolling along at the speed limit on the stretch
from Nouméa to Koné was no problem at all
and although the roads were far from ‘arrow’
straight, there wasn’t much in the way of
corners to worry the shoulders of the tyres.
ENDLESS TWISTY ROADS
From Koné, we headed across the island
to the east coast on RNP3 through the low
(1500m-ish) mountain range. The road across
the range twists and turns with a seemingly
endless series of bends flowing into the
KIWI RIDER 59