Piana to San Pietro, Corsica…last days in Piana & heading to the mountains

September 13 & 14 th

Pretty relaxed days visited some beaches, hung around the town, and did some reading. Plage d’ Arone is some 12 km out of Piana, past the trailhead to Capo Rosso, which we visited a few days ago. The weather has been great and the views are always beguiling…

We arrived early at plage d’Arone as we wanted to enjoy the morning before everything started to sizzle in the afternoon heat. Not a wild beach but certainly not overwhelmed by beach clubs and restos…2 higher-end places are on a slight rise overlooking the beach and the ocean.

I was entertained by the goings on at the yacht anchored offshore…as you can see it is a pretty impressive vessel albeit not quite in Russian oligarch territory.

    click pics to enlarge

We watched as the crew prepared a blow-up terrace for the guests on the stern of the boat, thereafter trotting out various toys: a serious-looking zodiac, a more modest zodiac, 4 sea doos, and a bunch of jet boogie boards….but no noodles!! Meanwhile, the owner (I am guessing) got in a long swim, emerging on the beach to do his exercises before returning to the boat all the while overwatched by security on sea doos…some of the others then jet boogie boarded to shore and back to the boat before racing off on the sea doos …I did like the jet boogie boards > you can drive above or below the water, pretty cool.

Some last views of Piana and it was time to pack for the next leg of our trip tomorrow…

 

September 15th

A rather modest day, overcast and with a hint of rain to come. We are heading into the heart of Corsica’s mountainous central region…

The first part of the drive to Porto is over familiar territory with the now normal twists and turns but the road seems rougher and the area poorer. There are pigs all over the place and we need to stop several times for these dudes.

We get some rain but once we crest Bocca di Vergjhu  1,467 m, the weather improves and we arrive in Corte which is situated at 486m boasting a population of some 8,000, as a university town it has an energetic vibe. We need to visit the Orange Boutique as our cell plan has expired … we gaffed thinking it was for 30 days whereas it was actually 14….a problem readily rectified with the addition of 30 Euros for 30 days. Then off to visit the old town…

We then headed to San Pietro de Venaco a hamlet some 10kms outside of Corte set on the side of a mountain…another AIRBNB, bit of a delay as the host is a little late but all ok in the end, he is a friendly sort and apologizes profusely. The goal is to do a decent hike tomorrow….tonite it is an eat-in dinner al fresco on the terrace which started off great…

… unfortunately, we had to retreat inside as it started to rain although the sunset was quite pretty, and hopefully the weather will cooperate for the hike tomorrow…