Porto Pollo is lovely. It has good shelter, plenty of reasonably priced mooring buoys, most supplies from small and very reasonable shops and a really nice cafe with free internet called ‘les Oliviers’. We spent a happy two night here and will come back again if we’re in this neck of the woods again.
We took our bikes out and cycled to Filitosa 15Km away – flat all but the last 2 K. It was really worth seeing! The site has been used from at least 4000BC until well into the second millennium. The menhirs aren’t huge like Stonehenge (they mostly weigh just under a ton) but they are sculptured with clearly recognisable faces and anatomical features. They are some of the earliest sculptures in the world. The site is beautifully preserved, uncrowded and with lovely atmospheric music composed especially for them. There is an excellent English commentary and guide book to explain it.
The bike ride back was hot sweaty and tiring – showing us how unfit we are. A cold beer in a cafe overlooking the beach in Porto Pollo was nectar.
All the way down western Corsica we had been very lucky with the weather and we didn’t want to push our luck in this tricky bit of sea. Bad winds weren’t forecast for us, but a storm to the west was kicking up a big 3M swell so we cracked on round the corner onto the south facing coast the next day so that the bays would shelter us from the westerly swell.
The first place we stopped at was a tiny and very shallow inlet called Tizzano. Shelter and holding in the outer harbour were mediocre at best so we put up our keel and went in past the mole into the inner harbour – just charted as <1M. There were mixed reefs and sand but nothing less than 0.8M so we anchored and settled down to enjoy the evening. Half an hour later, a small Juneau came in with six young people on board, and seeing us assumed they could anchor too and bowled in. As soon as I realised what they were doing, I shouted in halting French to tell them we only draw 0.7M. I’m not sure they understood but they slowed down to see what all the shouting was about – and hit one of the reefs gently. Luckily they were able to retrace their path and anchor in the bay. Just goes to prove the well known saying “Never follow a Southerly”.
It just shows how jaded you get: The next anchorage “Cala Roccapina” was in a rocky cove with a white beach and warm turquoise water and we just thought of it as “OK”. In England it would have been completely stunning! It was a bit lumpy with the strong SW swell still with us and just creeping round the corner. With the wind not being of the cause of the swell it was in a different direction so we were often sideways to the swell and got rolled around a bit. A second anchor to keep us head on to it would have contributed a lot to our comfort overnight. Another lesson learned!
Next day the swell had gone and we had a gentle tail wind down to Boneffacio. We broke out the Spinaker again which drove us along at 4Knots with a 7 Knot tail wind. Very satisfying!
Bonefaccio is lovely. Set in heavily weathered chalk cliffs (the only place in Corsica we saw that wasn’t granite). The harbour is in a deep ravine and completely safe if you don’t count the continuous stream of high speed tripper boats and the huge super yachts going in and out. The charges were very reasonable (€25 per night for us). There are loads of restaurants, launderettes, supermarkets and a few other shops on the East side of the quay and an excellent chandler and sailmaker on the other side (easy to miss if you don’t know he’s there).
The old town is high up on the headland surrounded by the huge walls and bastions of the Citadel. Well worth toiling up the hill to see. Restaurant prices and other prices are also better up there than by the harbour.
Next day we set off for Isle Lavezzi. This is a completely uninhabited island at the south eastern tip of Corsica. We got a place in the best anchorage and once the ribs and power boats went in the evening, moved and set the stern anchor to keep us pointed towards the entrance in case of swell or wash. The surroundings are stunning. Completely clear blue water surrounded by rocks sculpted and smoothed into amazing shapes. Despite being right in the straights of Bonefaccio, we had lovely calm weather. It was so glorious that we stayed a second night.
And then it was off to La Madelena in Sardinia.....
No comments:
Post a Comment