Cœur de Voh
Interesting facts
- Yann Arthus-Bertrand's photograph of the heart was first printed in 1992 in a little-known book of aerial views of New Caledonia, years before it became famous.
- Earth from Above, whose cover made the heart famous, went on to sell millions of copies in more than two dozen languages.
- The first stamp to show the heart was issued by New Caledonia's postal service in August 2000, using a photograph by Mike Hosken.
- In 2002 France's La Poste put Arthus-Bertrand's image of the heart on a stamp issued for Valentine's Day.
- The heart was formally protected on 13 February 2004 by Paul Néaoutyine, then President of the Northern Province, and a local heritage association formed weeks later.
- Since 2011 the heart's outline has served as the logo of New Caledonia's tourism body, and it also appears on the livery of the airline Aircalin.
- Since around 1990, pale grey mangrove has been spreading along the edges of the clearing, gradually reshaping the outline of the heart.
- The Témala River, at whose mouth the heart lies, flows into Chasseloup Bay on the north-west coast of Grande Terre.
Why it is worth it
From the air, a clearing in a New Caledonian mangrove takes the unmistakable shape of a heart. The Cœur de Voh is a natural opening of about four hectares in the mangrove forest at the mouth of the Témala River, on the north-west coast of Grande Terre, the main island of New Caledonia. What draws the outline is colour: the inside of the heart is colonised by pale grey mangrove, Avicennia marina, while the surrounding belt is made up of darker Rhizophora, so the figure stands out in two shades of green against the lagoon shore.
Nothing about the shape is designed. The heart is a tanne, a patch of bare, extremely salty mud enclosed by mangrove, where the soil holds more salt than seawater, stays waterlogged and starved of oxygen, and shifts with every tide. Only the grey mangrove, which breathes through upright aerial roots, can creep into the saltiest ground, while Rhizophora, propped on arching stilt roots, holds the margin. Geographer Jean-Michel Lebigre, who studied the site, described it as a dynamic vegetation form: probably several centuries old, the clearing has been partly recolonised and laid bare again over the decades, as aerial and satellite images taken since the 1950s show.
American aviators are said to have noticed the heart during flights over the island in 1942, but it became world-famous through photography. Yann Arthus-Bertrand photographed it from a helicopter in 1990, and the picture reached a vast audience when it appeared on the cover of his book Earth from Above in 1999. The image has since appeared on New Caledonian and French postage stamps and inspired the logo of the territory's tourism body. In 2004 the President of the Northern Province listed the Cœur de Voh as part of the country's protected heritage. Because it lies in a tidal swamp and its form can only be read from above, it is seen from a lookout on Mont Katepaïk or from light aircraft.
Getting there
The Cœur de Voh lies in the commune of Voh, in the Northern Province of New Caledonia. The nearest airport is Koné Airport (KNQ), about 23 km away, which handles domestic flights; light aircraft and microlights also fly over the site from the aerodromes of Koné and Voh. The nearest large town given by straight-line distance, Dumbéa near Nouméa, is about 230 km to the south-east.
On these lists
-20.93760, 164.65800per Wikidata