Day Four Unlock the Past Cruise Noumea

We arrived in Noumea quite early and were greeted on the docks with some dancers and drummers. As it is a large ship we are berthed at the container terminal. It is a bit cloudy but a comfortable 25 degrees.

Noumea is a French island so signs are in French. 

There are also a lot of English spoken though it is nice to listen to the melodic tones of the French language.

Being a tropical island there are many bright colours and flowers.

These were quite a bright splash of colour in the gardens.


We saw a few older buildings such as this one which has been used as a prison and other things during its history.

Alona, Anthea, Rosemary and I wandered around the city centre for  while and I dragged them into an iStore to see the iPad mini. I am not sure about that as it looks a bit small for my needs but maybe.

Then walking back to the drop-off point there was a French patisserie and of course we had to at least drop in for a look-see!

Although we were good and didn’t buy anything!
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Then an amble back to the pick-up point and a walk along a bit of the harbour front and a look at the ship towering above the containers on the other side of the container terminal. Even though the day was a bit gray the harbour did look nice. Although the below statue was a bit scary!

Then back on board ready for the afternoon talks.

Today was Shauna Hicks speaking on ‘Finding your Ancestors in Church Records’. These are at the other records associated with a church rather than the standard baptism, marriage and burials. These include centenary celebrations, newspaper reports of church activities, church newsletters, Religious newspapers and so much more. There was a lot more church attendance among our ancestors than today so these are a neglected resource.

Jill Ball gave a presentation on A Genealogist’s Toybox – gadgets and tech toys. The interesting thing of course is that pretty much any tech toy can be used for family history. It just takes some imagination.Tablets, cameras, digital recorders, laptops scanners, flip-pals are just a few of the nice things we can use.

Then there was the announcement that due to a problem with the electrics the ship would not be departing Noumea as scheduled but would be staying overnight. The means we miss Fiji but better to be safe. Doesn’t really make a difference to me as it won’t affect the conference except we changed the days around (made Thursday Friday) to allow for the extra day of sightseeing possible on Noumea.
 
Then dinner and back for  Paul Milner talking on Scottish Kirk Sessions and Poor Relief Records. The Scots were a pretty judgmental lot but this trait is great for family historians who can find out a huge amount of detail about the village life by reading the Kirk session records. You really want someone who is up before the session to add the life to your family history. I am not sure how effective it was at keeping people “behaving” as there seemed to be a lot of records relating to pre-nuptial fornication!