Corsica rocks

At almost six hours by car ferry on a glassy Mediterranean Sea, we felt we were leaving France. But we were immediately charmed by Calvi when we landed around 8 pm. From the wonderful smile on arrival at hotel reception, a captivating port area with the look and feel very similar to Hania in Crete and, unlike Greece and Turkey especially, an absence of commercial exploitation,      We were immediately impressed by the place.

 

 

So after settling in (one of us unpacks and stores everything at each hotel), we drifted down into town and our evening meal at one of the portside restaurants. Calvi is so relaxed and very natural even with tourists. Once again many millions wrapped up in yachts, which never ceases to amaze one of us.

 

The autoroute run from Uzes to Nice, at a little over 300 kms, was timed to perfection with about 20 minutes of travel time budget left on arrival at the port in Nice. A slow drive along the Promenade des Anglais and then a short wait to board the ferry. Perfect timing, if not really allowing much time for slippages. Happy duo. On board we read and dozed for quite a while before watching a bit of Djokovic seeing off Nadal in awesome fashion.

 

 

In the morning and after a portside breakfast, we observed the tourists, mostly French with a few northern Europeans thrown in, heading off for boating day trips along the coast. From breakfast we steadily climbed up through Calvi fort area for magnificent views over the area. Along the way we found a restaurant in a great setting with panoramic views and, despite being believers that there is an inverse relationship between restaurant views and quality of food and service, we made a booking for dinner that evening.



 

 

Day tour over we completed the mandatory wander through the shopping area - reminded us quite a bit of some parts of Greece - lots of small shops hiding in shady streets.

 

In the afternoon we drove over to L'Ile de Rousse where we had a swim in the to die for water and lazed around. We thought about but did not take the quite unique train which runs along this part of the coast.

 

  

And we did have an enjoyable dinner that evening at the best table on the balcony and the fare was pretty good.

 

 



But this is travel, not summer holidays in France, so it was time to move on. We were up for the 3-4 hour drive from Calvi to Ajaccio through the corsica rocks and our next city visit.

There were many big, coloured and quite strong looking mountains of rock on the road. And more than enough brave and courageous cyclists looking, and getting, quite a challenge. A road too small for large vehicles and engineered by people who like creating narrow curves made for lots of concentration. Not enhanced by the navigator almost hanging out of the car taking rock photos of course.

We also encountered a stream of at least 15 or more Porsches (mainly red) out for their training drive. Now we find out they were heading for an event in Bastia Friday evening.

From time to time one of us had entertained the idea to walk the GR20 which runs most of the length of Corsica. Not any more. The mountains are too tough, the terrain very dry and very few people about. We did see a few walkers but we also saw hitch hikers looking for a way out of the place. Ah well, perhaps the GR20 in the next life.

 By lunch we had earned our break in Porto, a slice of heaven. And from there it was not too long and we were in Hotel Napoloeon, just off Cours Bonaparte, museum Napoleon, house Napoleon, restaurant Bonaparte in Ajaccio. And another good day was had by all.

On first glance, Ajaccio is like other French cities. Feels a little like Sete and a little like Bordeaux. Quite grimy in places with an old city centre and surrounded by lots of high rise. But we always try and give new places a day or so before firming up views so we will have more to say about Ajaccio in our next blog.

But for now we are happy enough with a Brumbies win, a Toulon loss and an open mind for the french tennis titles in what seems to have been a great tournament.

And France is now covered in sunshine. What more could you want?