We have thoroughly enjoyed our 3 days and 4 nights in Bastia and the surrounding area.
Bastia is the business centre of Corsica and once was the capital (Napolean changed that - he must have figured that if he was born here then he could do as he liked). Long ago the Genoese developed the city and built the fortress, or citadel, which still remains as an area where people live. The walls of the houses are badly affected by the salt air but those who live there have great views over the Vieux Port below, the rest of the town and out to sea with Isle di Elba in the distance.
Bastia was an important port for them in the 15 C to export wine, firewood and olive oil. But the Genoese were newcomers to the area really because bones of someone who lived in the area 6000 years BC (yes, 6000 years BC) were discovered in 1990 and also the Greeks and the Romans were here long before the Genoese.
Today the commercial port is constantly busy with huge car ferries travelling to and fro, linking Corsica with mainland Italy and France.
Our marina, Port Toga, is quite new, but the old port, Vieux Port, right in the heart of the old part of town, also welcomes touring yachts and motor boats alongside the fishing boats.
Sunday night, our first night in Bastia, we walked into the Vieux Port area for dinner. On the way we walked through the 300 metres long Place St-Nicolas, a huge plaza lined with cafes and bars overlooking the commercial port. It's a popular spot for early morning coffee and pre-dinner aperitifs.
We had no idea what to expect of Vieux Port so it was quite a delight to discover this one-time medieval cove is surrounded by cafes, bars and restaurants at both the level of the port plus in balconies 2 and 3 levels above. It was about 9.00 pm and we were so hungry and tired we chose the first restaurant we came to but we hit the jackpot. Sitting on a lovely iron balcony, with a view over the port, we enjoyed a fabulous meal: Greg had seared crusted tuna with wok fried vegetables followed by a desert of fraises gratinee citrones (grated strawberries with lemon) and I had crevettes (prawns) risotto followed by the best fresh apricot tarte I have even eaten. A glass of champagne each was required first to give us plenty of time to study the menu, written in French and with no help from the waiters who did not speak English. An excellent Corsican rose from Patrimonio (one of the AOC wine areas) accompanied the meal.
Monday afternoon we explored the areas of Vieux Port and the Citadel, stopping for a rum and fruit (mango, passionfruit and strawberries) cocktail at one of the bars in the old port before ascending many, many steps to reach the Citadel. This area is mostly tiny lanes with crumbling multi-level homes (apartments now), which are supposedly going to be restored. Ste-Marie, the cathedral, has already been restored and has a majestic pale yellow facade.
We found a great restaurant for dinner up there, looking down over the entrance to the port with a lighthouse at the end of one of the stone jetties, the port and its cafes, and the sea beyond. The restaurant, A Cassarel, served typically Corsican food so for a first course Greg had grilled sardines and I had goat cheese souffle and we both had roast veal with grilled zucchini and fennel puree, all enjoyed immensely with a Corsican red wine. We couldn't resist the desserts - nougat ice cream for me and lime sorbet for Greg, with a glass each of Corsican muscat, which is a lighter bodied dessert wine than Australian muscat, but still very good.
If the two restaurants we have been to so far are any indication of the Corsican cuisine then we are going to have some fine food over the next 5 weeks. It is more expensive than our dining experiences along the Tuscan coast but it may be because summer prices have kicked in Corsica.
Tuesday we hired a car and drove along some of the most scenic routes we have ever experienced. We also discovered that the wealthy of Bastia live in fabulous villas all the way up the hilly roads that lead out of Bastia. Their views of the 3 ports of the town, the sea and Isola di Elba are incredible. Then just a few km up the hill from the marina are quaint villages such as Ville di Pietrabugno and San Martino di Lota, set into rugged mountain sides and again with incredible vistas. The road dropped down again to Miomo on the coast north of Bastia so we drove along the coastal road for a while, admiring both the villas in each hamlet and the coast itself. We stopped for a wander around Erbalunga and had a coffee at a cafe in the tiny port which has one of the surviving 65 Genoese towers that were built around the island as a surveillance network in the 16th C.
We were still only 9 km from Bastia so we decided to also drive over the mountains to the east coast town of St-Florent. Wow! What views! Firstly we had the amazing vistas of the coast behind us, then the valleys ahead with vineyards in the Patrimonio area, and finally the coastal areas ahead. We stopped at a winery along the road mostly because we wanted to take some photos looking over the vineyards to the coast and with a beautiful church tower in the scene. While there we figured we might as well taste the wine and thoroughly enjoyed the dry white, the rose, the red and the muscat dessert wine so we bought some of each. We were able to find out from the wine maker that one type of grape is used for each wine but as the bottles have no details here we don't know what other grapes, if any, are added.
(When you look at the photos Bill will post in the next few days you will see one of a couple of people at a table tasting the wines - is it really Diane and Greg?)
It wasn't smart to arrive in St-Florent at 6.00pm, just as everyone was doing the last of their evening food shopping after a day on the beach, because the town was really busy. To make it worse there was an endless string of traffic coming the opposite direction to us heading to a guitar concert in Patrimonio. Nevertheless we managed to find a great butcher to buy veal, sausages, lamb cutlets and a rotisserie chicken and a fabulous artisan boulangerie/patisserie to buy a baguette and a mielle feuille.
Fortunately we found another way back to Bastia so that we didn't have to join the throng going to the guitar concert. What a road! Superb views again over the mountains but the road was hardly wide enough for 2 cars. At one spot when a car came the other way we inched our way past each other. We stopped at Oletta to walk around the beautiful village which had an enormous gum tree growing at the gate of one of the villas.
Back to the boat for dinner on board: the rotisserie chicken and salad plus the mielle feulle and fresh strawberries.
Wednesday was a chores day: shopping for food, cleaning the boat inside and out, ironing (yuk). Dinner on board of lamb cutlets grilled on the barbecue, 3 veg (miss those veg) and dessert was a magnificent apple slice (bought at the local patisserie) with ice cream. A bottle of red from Massa Maritema - good stuff.
This morning we were up early to head off for Ile Rousse on the east coast and we were looking forward to our trip around the Cap, following the rugged coastline and watching out for those Genoese towers.
We had a peaceful journey, motoring for the first few hours because there was no breeze and then finally having a wonderful sail from 1.00 pm onwards. We are now anchored at Ile Rousse and have lots to tell about how beautiful it is.