On Wednesday 1st June we took Van Mauriceson on the ferry from Livorno to Bastia and drove to the north of Corsica to a campsite for the night.
There was no transport to Bastia which was half an hour’s drive away so we drove the following day to halfway where we could catch a bus into the city. Bastia was a charming city with interesting architecture and beautiful views once we had climbed up into the mountains. The citadel was an imposing structure overlooking the old port and we spent a few hours walking around the pedestrian friendly city with it’s good pavements and many cafes and restaurants.
After catching the bus back to the van we continued past many vineyards to Aleria, a beachside camping ground. The colour of the sea was exceptionally blue once the clouds had disappeared.
We found a great deal of Corsican wine in all the supermarkets. Apparently is not exported as there is a high enough demand for it on the island which has a very busy holiday period.
There were quite a number of tourists mainly French and some German and Dutch in the campsites in campervans and caravans as well as the most number of bikers that we had seen anywhere in Europe.
It was again too cool to swim so we drove through the centre of the island and up over the mountains to Corte the next day and climbed to the Citadel from where we had a wonderful view of the marina and the town. The town itself was pretty touristy so we continued on via Ile Rousse to Calvi where we chose a campsite very close to a beautiful bay with a nice white sand beach. It was well serviced by a little train into Calvi town but we chose to walk along the beach and the boardwalk which went all the way into the centre.
The weather had improved to being warm in the sun but still cool in the shade and given the awful floods in France we were pretty lucky.
We climbed up to the top of another Citadel with it’s massive walls. We had asked for a recommendation for lunch from a local and we hit the jackpot. We had the most delicious seafood meal
overlooking the bay. The old town itself was also very touristy and the souvenir shops had pretty tacky things for sale but we did find a Corsican icecream shop and I had the best creamy chocolate icecream that I had ever eaten. Maurice was pretty impressed with the one he had too – a Corsican canistrelli icecream with pieces of biscuit.
There were boulangeries all over the island, some selling very good artisanal breads and pastries and there were any number of cafes and restaurants. It was a short walk back along the beach to the campsite where the trees they used for shade were gum trees. The sea looked beautiful but it was a bit too cold to swim so we decided to continue on to Ajaccio the next day.