Leaving Sicily, meeting Sardinia and Corse!

        Leaving Sicily behind was hard. Such an amazing island, warm people, and rich cuisine are hard to find in one place. After Palermo, we sailed to Capo San Vito the NW cape that made an awesome starting point for the passage to Sardinia. Capo San Vito itself was maybe the best last secret of the island revealed to us proving its scarce diversity we already mentioned in the previous post.

        San Vito comes with a completely different flair, aromas, scenery, and architecture. With Cous-Cous being the most touristic plate you get the picture on what the Arab occupation has left behind. Palm trees, fine endless sand beaches, basic yet marvelous house and temple architecture are only a few things to mention. We stayed there only for a day as the passage to Sardinia required good timing and winds needed to be with us. A mix of waves direction and a gusty wind made the first couple of hours of the passage quiet uncomfortable yet we decided to keep on. It’s the life of the sailor, after all, you need to adjust and play with the cards you are given at the time. The passage itself was long and demanding and both Peter and I got close to our limits in terms of lack of sleep, tiredness, and hunger. However, Sardinia was soon to prove our call right and reward us with amazing light blue waters and a majestic scenery. We kept on sailing towards Cagliari where soon our guests would check-in and came across a live and lovely city with all we could ask for plus two funny and quite warm marinas. Once our guests came on board we set sails for lovely destinations like Carloforte, Bosa, Alghero and hidden anchorages in between. Alghero was their drop off point an amazing place to spend more than a few days.

     A welcoming flair and breeze hold you there, the people are smooth and easy going and the old city offers too much to resist. Following to Alghero, we set sails for further north, heading this time to Stintino and then to Propriano/Corsica to pick up the next guests. A mistral gave us the wind we needed to cover all these miles and “my way” once more has proven herself a great value us she sailed upwind with an average speed of 9.5 knots in both legs. Stintino is a unique little spot on the NW of Sardinia that promises thrills with two little picturesque fiords and apparently a feeling for guests. Once we reached Corse, Tizzano we had a pleasant night sleep and swim to the beach to get some food. As we ended up there we had to settle with a Corsican pizza which in my opinion is definitely an undervalued in comparison to the Italian ones nevertheless, it has its own power and is worth a try. The following 10 days were spent with guests on board visiting Propriano, Bonifacio, Ile de Cavallo and Porto Vecchio as well as a sail in between to the majestic archipelago of La Maddalena.

          Comparing Corse to Sardinia, although I risk being unfair to the Corsicans as my experience is only so far limited to the Southern part of the island and only related to the coast, I would say that Sardinia is the winner. Natural beauty is equally amazing in both islands, no doubt on that, yet in my opinion, the Southern Corsicans lack the ability to respect the traveler, are quite hostile and definitely overpriced for the service or the quality they offer. Some say that they do it on purpose in order to keep a higher level of tourism, yet I fail to understand how anyone with a strong budget or not, would understand as cool being treated in an impolite way at times, inhuman. To be fair, we also met lots of locals who were exactly the opposite, therefore sweet, polite and with a proper product to offer however the critical mass is not to their favor, they are outnumbered (to the sample so far) and consequently drugged down.