jimmy_the_builder
Well-known member
After a pleasant day in Villefranche on Saturday, we were up early on Sunday morning, and largely on a whim decided to head for Corsica. We knew that forumite EME was in Calvi, so we thought it might be funny to pop over to say hello.
So, four hours later, we arrived at Calvi (it's about 95nm south east of Antibes). This is the citadel that historically protected the port:
I think it was Wiggo that said that the absence of planning means that failure comes as no surprise (or words to that effect). Once we'd arrived we discovered that the port was full, and the capitanerie were reluctant to do anything helpful, like allowing us to put our name down for a berth in case one became available. The wind had picked up in the last part of our crossing, and by now it was blowing a hard F5 straight into the bay where the port is. Given that there was no space at the inn, we took a buoy outside the port entrance. It was pretty bouncy, and in the two hours it took us to have lunch, one of the bow lines holding us to the buoy had chafed through the gel coat near the fairlead, so it was pretty clear that we couldn't stay there.
This turned out to be a blessing in disguise - we just went round the corner, and found a titchy cove up in the nw corner of Corsica, and tucked in there. Although the wind was still gusting around a bit, we were fairly well sheltered and much more comfortable than Calvi. It was so lovely that we decided to stay the night. There were only four other boats in the anchorage, loads of space, blissful.
With no particular plan in mind, we decided to continue south. The scenery in this part of Corsica is just awesome, it's just so other-worldly in places.
As you get into the Scandola national park there is a well-known but squeaky-tight shortcut, this is the Gargalu passage. The almanac suggested that there was 3m depth - but it didn't mention that there's only about 6m width between the submerged rocks, which you find out once you are right in it. The local ribs blast through at planing speed, I'm afraid I wasn't quite so brave...
Once we were through, the sea flattened right off.
We were heading for Girolata. As we turned into the bay, we saw this poking out of the cliffs:
A bit closer. They've tucked this right into the shore, as we went past they were organising shorelines to the rocks:
This is Girolata. The (unprotected) port is tucked round behind the headland.
This was a nice setup - fore-and-aft buoys in about 2m of crystal-clear water. Very helpful guys in ribs zipping around organising everything, and a modest €37 for the night.
After a fab dinner at a restaurant up on the headland overlooking the anchorage, we had another early start to head back home to Antibes:
(to be continued in part 2 due to the annoying IPC policy of only allowing 20 images in a post)
So, four hours later, we arrived at Calvi (it's about 95nm south east of Antibes). This is the citadel that historically protected the port:
I think it was Wiggo that said that the absence of planning means that failure comes as no surprise (or words to that effect). Once we'd arrived we discovered that the port was full, and the capitanerie were reluctant to do anything helpful, like allowing us to put our name down for a berth in case one became available. The wind had picked up in the last part of our crossing, and by now it was blowing a hard F5 straight into the bay where the port is. Given that there was no space at the inn, we took a buoy outside the port entrance. It was pretty bouncy, and in the two hours it took us to have lunch, one of the bow lines holding us to the buoy had chafed through the gel coat near the fairlead, so it was pretty clear that we couldn't stay there.
This turned out to be a blessing in disguise - we just went round the corner, and found a titchy cove up in the nw corner of Corsica, and tucked in there. Although the wind was still gusting around a bit, we were fairly well sheltered and much more comfortable than Calvi. It was so lovely that we decided to stay the night. There were only four other boats in the anchorage, loads of space, blissful.
With no particular plan in mind, we decided to continue south. The scenery in this part of Corsica is just awesome, it's just so other-worldly in places.
As you get into the Scandola national park there is a well-known but squeaky-tight shortcut, this is the Gargalu passage. The almanac suggested that there was 3m depth - but it didn't mention that there's only about 6m width between the submerged rocks, which you find out once you are right in it. The local ribs blast through at planing speed, I'm afraid I wasn't quite so brave...
Once we were through, the sea flattened right off.
We were heading for Girolata. As we turned into the bay, we saw this poking out of the cliffs:
A bit closer. They've tucked this right into the shore, as we went past they were organising shorelines to the rocks:
This is Girolata. The (unprotected) port is tucked round behind the headland.
This was a nice setup - fore-and-aft buoys in about 2m of crystal-clear water. Very helpful guys in ribs zipping around organising everything, and a modest €37 for the night.
After a fab dinner at a restaurant up on the headland overlooking the anchorage, we had another early start to head back home to Antibes:
(to be continued in part 2 due to the annoying IPC policy of only allowing 20 images in a post)
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