On the road today! We got up, showered and packed our gear. Once checked out we headed for Calvi to find breakfast. We didn’t actually need to go quite as far as Calvi, but with the sun shining brightly we decided see what the town looked like with blue skies. As you can see, it looked pretty good!
We ventured back to the same small patisserie for our breakfast and we weren’t disappointed. As consistently good and fresh as it was yesterday! Can’t ask any more than that, right?
We didn’t hang around in Calvi very long because a fairly lengthy drive was ahead of us. So it was back into our car, destination Cargèse.
Ha! I just learned another feature. I discovered that I can take photographs while writing directly into the blog. I just took this photo of our Michelin map. Now a few adjustments.
Our route took us south past the airport almost to Galéria. However before reaching there we drove east along the Vée du Fango gorge and up into the mountains. We were going to drive this road yesterday, but the haze and rain would’ve made the experience disappointing to say the least. Today it was quite clear!
The mountains like most on Corsica are very rugged and beautiful. We must’ve been one of the earlier cars driving up here, but on our way out there were quite a few coming in. We found some hiking trails. We did track down AM’s poles and they are on their way to Holland where they should bd waiting for us. This might mean less hiking than originally planned😕
Once clear of du Fango, we started the real core of the drive. About 60 km of narrow, tortuous and in places spectacular driving through spectacular scenery. There were some particularly memorable sections that might be considered a little insane, but fun! You rarely get out of second gear! 😎
There were occasional places where we could pull off to check out the views. They were pretty awesome!
We arrived in Porto ready for s lunch break. We left the crazy road and followed a secondary road down to the water. It was full of restaurants and lots of cars and people walking towards the water. Some how Annemarie saw a place to park in an odd place, but it worked! We were right at the bottom by the water!
We went into one restaurant, but the waitress was so rude that we decided to go elsewhere. Very odd. Across the way we found a crepe restaurant where we share a salad and a delicious crepe. The folks there were very friendly🙂
After lunch we continued on and on coming around a corner it was like the world suddenly changed! Les Calanche! By chance I had been looking at Google Earth Pro a month ago and had happened to find this place. I’d forgotten about it, but when we drove around one of many sharp corners there it was, and I immediately remembered.
I parked in a tiny pull out just barely big enough for the car. Annemarie said she’d wait while I walked up the road.
The pillars are huge, but just how huge probably doesn’t show properly in the photos. There are also some rock spires, but I’d been walking a while, so went back to find Annemarie and I unfortunately missed photographing them. We both wondered afterwards why she didn’t come with me. A mystery.
We drove on eventually arriving at Cargése. We drove to our beachfront accommodation that we’d booked yesterday on Booking.com. There had been an unexpected issue after Annemarie booked. The rate with all fees and taxes was €111, however there were hidden fees that showed up in an odd place. Anywhere from €35-70 for sheets and towels plus a €50 cleaning fee. That’s pretty expensive and not the way Booking works. I called Booking.com and they told me that this practice was unacceptable and that they would contact the property to advise them to wave these fees or their listing would be dropped. We were told that if charged Booking would cover our costs. So we were wondering what our reception would be like. We arrived and were told that we’d pay exactly €111 and no other charges. And that’s what we paid!
We eventually went door a swim. The waves were a pretty good size too.
Tomorrow we carry on southwards.
Cheers!
Geoff
Distance Walker - Wandering & Wondering! 