Day 1: Corsica!

We have arrived!

I must say getting ourselves here wasn’t quite as smooth as hoped for, but that’s travel. Long story short, our planes out of Vancouver, Montreal, and Paris were all delayed for various reasons. Originally we had a 3.5 hour layover in Paris, but with the lengthy delay in Montreal we had less than an hour to clear customs, pass through yet another security lineup and find our way across the airport to the departure gate for our EasyJet flight to Ajaccio. Our stress levels climbed slightly when Security pulled our bags for a closer inspection just 15 minutes before our flight was due to depart. Surprisingly we actually made it to our gate in time only to discover that the flight to Ajaccio was delayed. Such is travel. No foul, no harm!🙂

We both fell asleep on the flight south, but woke with a start as we hit some clear air turbulence! Wide awake we began to anticipate our arrival.

After landing we decided that since we’d been up and on the go for some 28 hours that it was worth an extra €10 over the bus price to catch a taxi into Ajaccio. A little self care was in order!

We found our Airbnb without trouble and after a 4 story climb we were in! A nice find in a very central location.

Two bedrooms up and a full kitchen. Just lacking any toilet paper! An email and a phone call and we were in business (pun intended)! A bit of time to unwind and have a shower then out to find dinner. It was Sunday late afternoon when we arrived, but we managed to find a place that was open. Wine ordered and we started to relax!

After dinner we decided to go for a little walk to try and shake off some of the jet lag. We walked down to the harbor, which was just a short distance away.

Then it was home to again climb the 4 stories and to find some much needed sleep!

This morning feeling somewhat refreshed we headed off to find breakfast. Fresh croissants, fresh squeezed orange juice and our individual morning hot drinks set the tone for a nice day!

Needing SIM cards for our phones we walked up to the Orange cellular store only to discover that they did not sell the SIM card plans that we had found online. Really? This was something of a surprise because we have used Orange many times in other parts of the EU without issue. We were referred down the street to a tobacconist shop where apparently we could purchase an Orange SIM card. However, the owner there told us that he didn’t have what we were looking for and that it was crazy that Orange didn’t sell their own prepaid SIM cards. With a typical French shrug he explained, “it’s France”, like that explained everything. So at this point we don’t yet have new SIM cards, but we are working on it. AM is researching this as I write.

We then wandered down to the train station to buy tickets for the train north on Wednesday only to find that you can only purchase on the day of travel. Wow! Corsica is definitely a bit different, but we like that so no problem.🙂

We walked back into central town along the waterfront. Ajaccio is the main port on the west side of Corsica with ferries to/from Marseille and Sardinia arriving and departing once per day. They are large ships capable of handling the Mediterranean winter storms.

Having entertain ourselves in the harbour we set off to wander the streets in the old part of town. Ajaccio’s historic claim to fame is that it’s the home of Napoleon Bonaparte. You see his image everywhere, and seemingly everyone is trying to cash in!

The old town covers a fairly small area, surrounded by a wall on the seaward side where the citadel sits.

The waterfront is a lovely walk, but after a while we turned around in search of a cold drink before lunch. At this point it was 26°.

We looked for, and found a couple of baguette sandwiches, which we took back to our accommodation. The heat is going to climb through the afternoon, so we decided to take a break, but not before finding a nice grocery store above a small department store close by our place. We will eventually walk back there to find a few breakfast groceries as our small breakfast cost €17.

Time now for a siesta!