Sunday, May 12
I'm taking a break from the mountains and spending a little time with the sea; afterall, this place is an island. I woke up with both the sunlight and my alarm. The room had gotten stuffy at night so I'd cracked the door to the balcony open and left the curtain only partly drawn. I'd booked a boat sightseeing tour at 9AM so the alarm was to ensure I'd be up on time not to miss it.
By 8:15, I'd checked out, had my coffee and a pain au chocolat (feels weird to say it instead of chocolatine), and had found the harbor of Porto. By daylight, the town is much smaller; it's got a type of charm to it: not quite a historical village vibe but only small hotels lend an atmosphere between authentic and campy.
The harbor has a ridge looming over it. The weather was looking very good this morning and the water very calm.
The town looks smaller in the daylight but the landscape is bigger.
The ride started by heading south along the golfe de Porto to visit the pink granite cliffs of les Calanques de Piana. The captain provided a few comments over the course of the trip, it was nice that she did French and then English for the group (the order helped to confirm my understanding from the French explanation). The Calanques were interesting, some strange formations to be found. We finished the Calanques section at Capo Rosso, the cape featured an old Genovese tower (a network of ~80 towers were built to surround all of Corsica) that from sea level equaled the height of the Eiffel tower AND there was a natural channel carved out of the cape large enough for our boat to pass through.
I mounted my seat/saddle and we were ready to cast off!
Turns out there'll be a number of these kinds of windows to be seen on this boat ride, but I'd better snap a pic of this first one before I get de-sensitized to how cool they are.
A quick stop to show off a tiny old fishing village, today the cabins feature as remote getaways. Per the guide, the fishing of the village was done from the pier and not by boat; I'm dubious of this.
Pretty quickly we were getting up real close and personal to some pink granite walls and inlets.
Not all the cliffs/calanques were pink granite; those sections lacking in iron looked comparatively dull compared to their brightly colored neighbors.
A bit of phosphorus creeping in / out of the rocks.
I was surprised we motored into the cave and then simply backed out of it.
Spotted the nest (nid) of a fishing eagle.
There's a Genovese tower nestled atop the Capo Rosso, the furthest west point of Corsica
It's getting warm, somebody should open a window
Inside the Capo Rosso channel; the tour guide had turned on some music for this section. I'm not sure what category nor language the song was in, but it seemed like a climatic number in a musical.
The channel wasn't straight but formed a "Y"
The 2nd part of the boat tour was the Scandola nature preserve. Turns out that by boat is the only way to view this part of Corsica, it's forbidden to enter by foot and even boats are only allowed to anchor for up to 12 hours. This part of the island featured rheolite and basalt instead of granite, the guide said the other part of this volcanic formation is the Massif de Lesterelle near Cannes. This part of the tour finished with a cave where we could see a big merlu (hake) poking it's head out of a crack underwater.
Scandola featured some clearly tilted slabs of rock
When the guide first mentioned that this part of the island was made of volcanic rocks like basalt, I thought, "wow, that's so interesting that a part of the island would be made of a different category of rock" but then remembered that granite is also igneous... Still, the conditions needed for basalt vs granite make this is distinct aberration compared to the rest of the isle
The giant hole is the result of a bubble of volcanic gas getting trapped under the basalt and then being exposed by erosion. I know this is a silly thing to get hung up on considering the volcanic activity literally created the entire mass of the island; but that was a big bubble of gas.
Once cooled, the igneous rock then formed layers and has become subject to other forces at play. I thought this looked like a sinking ship 😂
The guide said the wildlife of Scandola includes goats, wild pigs, cormorants, fishing eagles, and "elephants"
The guide pointed out that this formation, from this angle, bears resemblance to symbol of Corsica, the guy with his mouth open. Who wore it better?
This deposit, of I'm guessing granite, reminded me of seeing massive ore deposit just milling about the surface of a planet in No Man's Sky. Just a random, bulbous splotch on the surface.
Probably one of the bigger windows I saw on this boat ride.
Zipping past the island with the Genovese tower but this also captures the green signs that were periodically posted to the rocks of Scandola.
I wonder what causes those yellow streaks on the rocks. Also, how the heck did they get supplies to build and maintain a tower outpost here?
And here we encounter a few columns (rows?) of basalt, weird to think the planet flipped the whole thing 90 degrees
(╯‵□′)╯︵┻━┻ but only half-way; I'm not sure what'd be left to see if the whole landscape got flipped 180 degrees...
A young cormorant hopping up and drying off
In this azure grotto, we could see some smaller fish milling about beneath the surface and some jellyfish (les méduses) puttering about
I tried to snap a pick of the merlu hanging out it its crevice but the surface glare wasn't cooperating.
I remember thinking that the texture of these walls looked bizarre; somewhere between pachyderm skin and popcorn walls.
The line of growth near the water line is a type of algae that grows just a tiny bit per year
As we were leaving, I noticed the surface was littered with these floating jellyfish. They're harmless and float & sail on the surface of the sea.
Between sections and the motor back into port, the guide made use of the giant speakers under each of our seats and blasted some lovely music. It occurred to me how serenely different this experience was from yesterday's: tranquil silence compared to bombastic bass, a slow climb versus zipping across calm waters. The views from below were different from above, I'm glad I got to try both on this trip.
Off in the distance, we could make out the peak of Monte Cento, the tallest peak on Corsica. Having faced off against Mont D'Oro and blinked, I'll take Monte Cento off my list of mountains to hike for the time being.
We picked up some speed as we zipped past on the west side of Scandola. So long!
After returning to the harbor, I took a walk over to the beach of Porto and relaxed for a bit. Only a small portion of the beach was sandy while the rest was full of pebbles. It got toasty in the sun, if I'd been wearing my swimsuit and had a towel would have considered taking a dip in the blue water.
Not too many people were hanging out on the beach just yet, but those that were there seemed to be settling in for a long afternoon.
Finally dipped my feet in the Mediterranean this trip. It was just a bit on the chilly side...
But gosh does the water look appealing
I eventually packed it in and returned to the car. There was a car charging station on the way out of town so I stopped to refuel and have lunch. I probably didn't need to do a full charge, the distance estimates of the car are made inaccurate by the regenerative braking done on the down-hill sections but this gave me peace-of-mind for the rest of the trip.
I've given up on figuring out what plants are native to Corsica but this patch of flowers along the road caught my attention.
Oh joy, tree of heaven. Good thing this island hasn't been found by the spotted lantern flies yet.
My table of one became a table of two
The animals just wanted to hang out at first; towards the end of my meal, I think the cats got the idea that the plate of charcuterie could possibly be shared and started making some noise 🤣
Juiced up and ready to ride!
From Porto, I made the winding drive along the coast back to Ajaccio; with the full sun it was a different kind of drive compared to last night. As I pulled into Ajaccio proper, things started to look more like the mainland: buildings and infrastructure reminded me of towns I'd seen in Spanish Basque country - not the decor but the layout.
I made several stops as I drove across the Calanques; its interesting to have both the land and sea view of this rock formation.
The drive through the Calanqes de Piana reminded me of national parks in the US like Zion; the road wound its way around the wall of rock and sometimes a passage was carved out with rock on either side.
A little heart-shaped window as I leave the Calanques behind.
The journey to Ajaccio follows the coast, which means a lot of gulfs to drive the perimeter of.
But they're still picturesque gulfs, so I don't mind.
After check in at the hotel, a brief discussion with the concierge yielded a recommendation for a walk around town since most offices and museums were closed for the evening. There was a festival with market going on in the main square and I enjoyed another session on the beach before working my way to the park dedicated to the emperor. Ajaccio was Napoleon's birthplace but he only visited once as an adult but the town went all-in on him.
There's even an Halle here in Ajaccio, or at least there was. On the other side of the building, I think it's been converted to an office of tourism.
But with plenty of plaza space and booths selling seemingly everything (produce, meats, electrical appliances, toys, sculptures, etc.) I guess they don't need an Halle.
Ah, so this big little market isn't a permanent thing...
Wow, there's really great visibility again today; all these mountains are quite far from Ajaccio.
A few fishing vessels in the harbor
I'd gotten peckish so was super happy when the waiter brought out snacks with my Cap Corse.
This section of Ajaccio's beaches had plaques dedicated to Henry Matisse who apparently had spent some meaningful time on the island
My feet aren't in the water, but it was still good to relax on the beach in Ajaccio for a bit before sunset.
This beach wasn't a super fine sand but was at least soft and rounded grains.
There goes a ferry, off into the night
While walking around, I stopped to smell/inspect various flowers growing around the townhouses. Per Google Lens: Melia Azedarach
These bougainvillea were so colorful but hardly had a scent
Some dirt tennis courts at one of the bigger parks
Wow, now that is a memorial fitting of an emperor
Maybe this pose makes more sense when your shirt actually lets the hand through...
Just some encyclopedias laying out in the park; I checked, Corsica doesn't have an entry so I guess it doesn't exist...
The old town was an interesting walk-through at night: the paved streets and old facades sometimes had hidden alleys and small plazas.
I was impressed to see a stone arch in a laundromat, it really is imperial
Dinner was in the old town at 20123, a restaurant replicating an old town to the south east. It was a bit campy and probably targeted at tourist busses but I enjoyed the replica of the town they had inside the restaurant and thought diners needing to fill their water vases at the town fountain was a stroke of genius.
I'm not sure why, but filling up my pitcher of water at the town fountain was just the coolest thing to me; I'm pretty sure I was grinning like a little kid the whole time 😂
Dinner was 5 courses and came with an obscene amount of really tall bread; be sure to come hungry
The confiture to accompany the brebis cheese had whole figs soaking inside 😋
Not the main area with the fountain but it's impressive, the lengths they went to in decorating the entire restaurant interior.
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