AJACCIO

29 September – 01 October 2022

We checked out of the lovely Grand President Hotel in Olbia needing to retrace our footsteps back to Corsica. We would drive to Olbia Airport to return our Mini rental car, catch the 10h40 bus to Santa Teresa at the Airport terminus and, on arrival, expected to be just after 12 midday, would need to hightail down to the port to catch our pre-booked 12h30 ferry.

Empowered by predictable and efficient public transport, we disembarked the ferry in Bonifacio just after 13h30.

We were a bit nervous as we walked along the promenade in front of all the shops and the hotel we had stayed at the week before, as we approached the parking lot, hoping and praying that our car was still there in one piece.

Hallelujah! It was still there.

Absolutely delighted, we exited the parking lot and hit the road in the direction of Ajaccio.

Since we still had the Corsican Sim card we were able to do some googling to decide on our stops along the way. Knowing we would not make it all the way through to dinner time on our early hotel breakfast alone, we decided to stop in Sartene, which had great reviews on a few sites we checked .

It was a very scenic drive as we drove inland from the coast and with the blue sea minimising behind us we became engulfed in the greenery of the mountainous terrain we were traversing.

Arriving in Sartene at around 3pm, we anticipated parking to be an issue, so we took the first available spot we saw, at the base of a steep hill at the entrance to the town, and advanced on foot. 

The reviews never really give a sense of magnitude and everything in Sartene was smaller and closer than anticipated. 500m later we were at the central Piazza Petro photographing the panorama, crudely translating the inscription on statues and looking for somewhere to offer a quick bite.

As with most piazzas, there were sidewalk cafes dotted around the edge. We were keen to get back on the road though, so not in for the long haul matching the existing patrons in their lounge chairs watching the day go by.

We thus picked the low-key take away kitchen at the entrance to the square which, with its couple of barrel tables and chalkboard offering panini and burgers, seemed like they’d be able to turn us around fast and happy.

We ordered kebab galettes – a choice made infinitely more simple since it was all they had left of the list of lunch specials on the board – and were soon chomping away happily on fat, neatly stuffed wraps, and commending ourselves on the sensible choice since the crunchy fresh garnish was the closest we’d come to veg in days!

Fuelled and motivated to complete our journey, Chris negotiated the narrow and winding road down through valleys and up around hillocks while I admired the Vistarama and remarked at the pinhead-sized towns that popped up here and there on the hillside. 

With sturdy grey stone structures hinting at a lot of history behind those walls, we wondered how those random settlements had come to be, who lived there… and whether it would be worth planning a Work From Anywhere trip to really test the ‘remote’ in remote working.

The surrounding area was so thick and green and so contoured and textured – only punctuated with brown splashes where steep rock faces broke through the forests – that I suspect that if you were looking down on this area, zoomed in from the satellite or something, it may like a head of broccoli!

Our route (The Only Route between Bonifacio and Ajaccio) wove us back to the coast and past a small town called Propriano that we had seen on reviews while we were planning our itinerary and had been a strong contender for an overnight stay. We could see the appeal of the magnificent clear blue bay with cheerful multi-coloured buildings cuddled onto its coastline and yachts bobbing around the marina, willing holidaymakers to take to the seas.

I kept looking over my shoulder and out the back window to catch a glimpse of the little bay, vowing that should we return to Corsica, we would add this to our future itinerary.

All the while, with Romesh for company, we were making headway towards our ultimate destination, Ajaccio.

It was a stark dose of reality, after being on holiday for a couple of weeks already, to get a taste of the real world again; approaching Ajaccio we got caught in the end of day traffic!  Worsened by an accident on the marina close to our final destination, movement had slowed to such a point that we were estimated to require 26 minutes to cover the last 2 km of a journey. We were tempted to leave the car (again) and walk the final distance!

Nonetheless, with nerves of steel, Chris got us to where we needed to be. Our patience was rewarded when as we were checking in to Le Dauphin, a car pulled out of the parking bay right in front of the hotel, providing us with a free parking bay that would save us €10 of paid parking per day, as well as the 200 meter walking to and from the parking lot. 

Eager to see a little of the town before it got dark, we headed straight out and directed ourselves along the water’s edge and citadel wall, through the old town and up to the Place Charles de Gaulle and its statue of Napoleon Bonaparte, who was famously born in this town. 

After a cursory wander around to get our bearings, we happened upon an Irish pub, where we could continue our quest for culture by adding a listing onto our Guinness index.

Since we had had such a filling and late lunch in Sartene, and with no compulsion to force a dinner we rather enjoyed soaking in the old town atmosphere, browsing the restaurant menus and stopping in here and there for a drink.

FRIDAY

Waking to a grey sky, we wasted no time donning our runners and doing a lap the full length of the promenade to the beach at the far end; the same section we’d first walked the previous evening. 

Ajaccio really was a picture postcard coastal city, that looked very tropical with all its tall mature palm trees along the promenade. It had a lot of old world charm with its restored and renovated pastel buildings curving along the shoreline and must have been a heavenly sight for the weary sailors coming in to port for the last few hundred years, looking for a good meal and a night on the town.

We had decided to forgo the breakfast at the hotel since experience had told us that they were all the same very continental offering with a hot drink, a cold drink, a pastry and jams. We decided instead that we would pop our heads in ear one of the many boulangeries we had seen and leave the menu in the hands of fate.

Heading up into the old town, we skipped the first bakery because there was a long queue at the door and there was no shortage of boulangeries so a wait unwarranted. We went into the second shortly thereafter and grabbed a pain au chocolat and a sugar crested brioche to get us started. 

At literally a couple of Euro, we applauded our adventure as well as our economy, as we chomped on the fresh and light baked goods.

On a good wicket and not quite sated, we thought we’d stop in at the next boulangerie, and were soon trying another local store where we ordered a ham and cheese pie. With a smooth cheese sauce filling and lumps of diced ham, the pie was light and flaky and would have been a perfect 10 if only it was heated.

Still talking about how clever we were to have found two great boulangeries, we stumbled across a third, emitting such fabulous aroma that we could not help but enter. This one had pizza sub sandwiches on crunchy French loaf (probably just called ‘loaf’ in Corsica), which we had to sample. With great restraint we ordered one to share.

By now we’d walked almost to the other end of the promenade and were approaching the docks so there was little more to see. With the weather still miserable our initial thoughts of beaching the day away were also dashed. As it started to drizzle, we sought solace in a massive Carrefour supermarket.

It was very easy to wile away an hour of grocery tourism in the store that was so big it has TWO wine sections, each a double sided aisle running the length of the store!

Chris also got to demonstrate to me all the self service checkout technology in this store that he’d experienced on his visit to Paris a few weeks prior. Such clever tech and so user friendly!

Thinking we’d out-waited the rain, we emerged from the store. We were about halfway back home when the clouds opened properly and we were absolutely drenched in a flash cloudburst! 

This time we hibernated back to our hotel and didn’t come out again until we were surer than sure that the rain had dried up.

Emerging again, we made our way up to Old Town for some sundowners, feeling perfectly justified at starting early since the sun hadn’t actually had the good grace to come out in the first place. 

We used the downtime to research dinner options; a mean feat since there were SO many restaurants to choose from. We eventually settled on one recommended by our trusty travel aid app, The Fork, and then settled in for the wait until our reservation (19h30, earlybirds special by Corsican standards) rolled around.

Committed to having anything but pizza and pasta, we enjoyed a fabulously French snails to start, with Corsican sausage bangers ‘n mash and a beef joulet for mains and a cracking bottle of local Red to wash it all down.