Travels with my mother

New Caledonia has a fond place in Liza Power's family folklore. Now she writes the next chapter. It's a pilgrimage of sorts, this journey along the spine of New Caledonia's Grande Terre. Thirty years ago, soon after they were married, my parents hireda Peugeot, armed themselves with a dogeared map and a tattered French dictionary, and traced their way from Noumea, the island of New Caledonia's capital, to Pouebo, the last village on the northcoast. At a time when few tourists strayed from the glitteringharbours, swanky resorts and palmfringed shores of Noumea, it wasan ambitious trip. The story of their adventure following dirtroads riddled with potholes, battling punctures, chancing on aresort owned by a famous French tennis player, being rescued by apuzzled farmer aboard a tractor after becoming bogged is familyfolklore. So here we are, my mother and me, she again with map and dictionary in hand, leaving the pretty sprawl of Noumea for thevelvetgreen mountains, mudbrick huts and soaring cliffs of Province Nord. Advertisement: Story continues below This is not my first visit to New Caledonia. That was when I was just 15, studying French at the Creipac language school at Nouville. It was an impressionable age, and I was quickly seducedby delicious poire belle Helene, the heavy scent of frangipani andthe postcard looks of Baie des Citrons. Housed in what was once acolonial prison New Caledonia was founded as a penal colony bythe French in 1864 the schoolroom faced the ocean on a wind sweptpeninsula just outside the capital. For a week I chantedcon jugations of etre, avoir, faire and parler Rosetta Stone Outlet to the sound of wavespounding the sand outside the classroom door. Each morning I jogged the Route de la Baie des Citrons, apalmbordered promenade that chases the shoreline from Hotel Ibisto An se Vata beach, and climbed the forestcloaked summit of Ouen Toro, for sunrise over the water. On that trip, my mother introduced me to the French bus inesslunch, and rewards for lessons learnt in class came in the form of extravagant menu du jours taken in every restaurant from the Latin Quarter to the Place de Cocotiers. My job was to translate the specials board mother's job was to decide between vin blanc orvin rouge. Afternoons then were devoted to bus rides, from the chaotic citybus station to the outer suburbs of Vallee des Colons, Trianon,Magenta, Montravel and Nouville. Leaving the leafy streets of the capital, with their colonial mansions, pavement cafes and glamorous Metros recent immigrants from France we reached the toweringtenement buildings, graffiticovered bus stops and dim, barredgrocery shops of the indigenous Kanak suburbs to find the otherside of paradise. Now, behind the wheel of another Peugeot, we're escaping the city limits bound for Caldoche country. Descendants of the original French convicts, the Caldoche represent the third tier of New Caledonian society. Considered rather rough and unsophisticated by Noumea's Metros, the Caldoche are largely cattle farmers living inthe island's rural belt. On vast properties dotted by horses and herds, many Caldochelive in magnificent, rambling colonial chateaus that date to the1800s. As we drive, these mansions appear intermittently by theroadside, some like perfectly preserved museum pieces, othersnearderelict, wearing wild, flaming skirts of bougainvillea andhibiscus. Henri, from Noumea's tourist bureau, has advised us on a route,taking the Col des Rousssettes, which links Bourail on the westcoast to Houailou in the east, through Grande Terre's ruggedinterior and returning along La Transver sale, which snakes throughthe mountains between Touho and Kone. They're all sealed roads, he assures us, much to my mother's relief her desire to repeat the journey does not extend torepairing punctures or pursuing farmers with tractors.

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