L'Île-des-Pins is a

commune A commune is an alternative term for an intentional community. Commune or comună or comune or other derivations may also refer to: Administrative-territorial entities * Commune (administrative division), a municipality or township ** Communes of ...

in the South Province of New Caledonia, an overseas territory of

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

in the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contin ...

. L'Île-des-Pins is made up of the Isle of Pines, the smaller Kôtomo Island, and several

islet An islet is a very small, often unnamed island. Most definitions are not precise, but some suggest that an islet has little or no vegetation and cannot support human habitation. It may be made of rock, sand and/or hard coral; may be permanen ...

s around these two, as well as the distant island of Walpole, which is located almost to the east. The Isle of Pines and adjacent islands are located to the south of New Caledonia's mainland. At 16,830 km from

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

, L'Île-des-Pins is further from the French capital than any other commune of France. The settlement of Vao, on the Isle of Pines, is the administrative centre of the commune of L'Île-des-Pins. L'Île-des-Pins is one of the main tourist attractions in New Caledonia. The Isle of Pines itself is nicknamed ''l'île la plus proche du paradis'' ("the closest island to Paradise"). L'Île-des-Pins can be reached by boat or plane from

Nouméa Nouméa () is the capital and largest city of the French special collectivity of New Caledonia and is also the largest francophone city in Oceania. It is situated on a peninsula in the south of New Caledonia's main island, Grande Terre, and ...

, the capital of New Caledonia. It is renowned for the intense blue colors of its waters and for the ancient pine tree groves spread throughout the Isle of Pines and the neighboring islands. After the

Paris Commune The Paris Commune (french: Commune de Paris, ) was a revolutionary government that seized power in Paris, the capital of France, from 18 March to 28 May 1871. During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, the French National Guard had defended ...

(1871), about 2,800 Parisian insurgents were deported to L'Île-des-Pins, a part of whose territory was turned into a penal settlement where the convicts lived for several years. In 2005 L'Île-des-Pins gained attention when season 5 of French reality show '' Les Aventuriers de Koh-Lanta'' ("The Adventurers of Koh Lanta"), the French version of '' Survivor'', was set on several small islands off the Isle of Pines.

References

External links

Audio interview (in English) with Isle of Pines resident available at ULiveWhere.com
Iledespins {{NewCaledonia-geo-stub