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Gizo

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The Western Province's capital, a waterfront market town on Ghizo Island, with Kolombangara across the water and the PT 109 islands to the south-east.

Fly to Gizo All of Solomon Islands
Arrival
Nusatupe · GZO
To the town
Boat shuttle from the airstrip island, 2 km offshore
Private jets
Jets clear at Munda (MUA)
Best time
May to October

The city

Market, moorings and reef.

Arthur Mahaffy set up a government station here in January 1900, with orders to stamp out headhunting, and the Methodists followed two years later. Gizo is now the second town of the Solomons. Yachts put in for supplies and repairs, and the big market has banned plastic bags, so shopping goes home in woven coconut baskets.

The water is the reason to come. Divers count more than 275 species of fish at Grand Central Station, and wartime wrecks lie within a short boat ride of town. Just south-east are Plum Pudding, Olasana and Naru, the islets where John F. Kennedy and the crew of PT 109 waited to be found; Robert Ballard used Gizo as his base when he went looking for the boat in 2002. Surfers have two long, shallow breaks, a right at Palonggi and a left at Titiana's.

  • Toa Maru A 440-foot Japanese freighter, intact on the bottom and first on Dive Gizo's list of highlights.
  • The Hellcat An American fighter sitting almost whole in very shallow water, a short boat ride from town.
  • Plum Pudding Island One of the islets where the PT 109 survivors went ashore, just south-east of Ghizo.

Arriving

An island built for an airstrip.

Gizo's airstrip is on Nusatupe, two islets that wartime engineers levelled and joined for the US Army Air Forces. The coral runway is under 900 metres, and a boat shuttle covers the short crossing to town.

Business & First Class Airline flights Solomon Airlines comes in from Honiara in an hour to an hour and a half, often stopping at Seghe and Munda on the way. Munda itself is a fifteen-minute flight. Business & First fares Private Jet Private flights Nusatupe's short coral strip is not a port of entry. A jet clears customs at Munda, about 50 kilometres to the south-east, and the last stretch is the scheduled Twin Otter or Dash 8, or one to two hours by boat. Charter a jet
Approximate flying time by midsize jet
  • Brisbane 3 h 10
  • Nadi 3 h 30
  • Sydney 4 h 10
  • Auckland 5 h 05
  • Bangkok 8 h 55 long-range jet

When to go

May to October.

Thirty degrees or a touch more, all year, and a sea that never drops below 28. The rain is the thing to plan around: close to 400 mm in January, and still about 250 in the driest months. Tourism Solomons recommends the dry season, May to October.

  1. 31° J 396 30°
  2. 31° F 356 30°
  3. 31° M 363 30°
  4. 31° A 305 30°
  5. 30° M 270 29°
  6. 29° J 246 29°
  7. 30° J 362 28°
  8. 30° A 277 28°
  9. 31° S 281 28°
  10. 31° O 254 29°
  11. 31° N 245 29°
  12. 31° D 288 30°
Best months weather2travel.com, long-term averages

Elsewhere in Solomon Islands

More reasons to come.

All of Solomon Islands

Flying to Gizo?

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Business & First Private Jet