To Europe
The journey from Fes to Calvi was a saga and, in
parts, a treat. Just as we perversely had to leave the continent of Africa to
transfer in London en route to to Morocco from Cape Town, the journey from Fes
to Calvi, which on the map looks like a short hop over the Mediterranean, also
required that we route through Gatwick. We looked hard at numerous alternatives
but all other routes were prohibitive in terms of time or cost or both. So we
made the most of it and incorporated a night on a
boat.
I was even sadder to leave Fes than I'd expected. I liked southern Africa just as much - and my guess is that we'll return sooner - but we didn't develop the attachment to one particular place that spending the entire month in Fes engendered. While you could see the essential sights in the Fes medina in a few days - and most visitors apparently do - there is a richer experience to be had picking through the medina's crazy streets each day for a month.
From Gatwick we flew to Marseilles, where we caught a huge ferry to Ile Rousse in Corsica. The journey took 12 hours and we had a cabin for the four of us. This is a good point to mention that we also had another cabin for Paula's parents, who have joined us for the first few days of our stay here and will be looking after Zoe and Heidi while Paula and I spend two weeks walking the GR20, a waymarked walk across the mountainous backbone of the island. More on the GR20 another time...
The ferry journey was great. We dined on board and after kicking around on deck to see the sunset retired to our cabin. When I'm doing night journeys on planes I sleep better when there's gentle turbulence to rock the plane (assuming I'm flying with a flat seat) and the motion of the boat across the sea had the same effect. And the best part was that we were arriving in Ile Rousse.
I love Corsica. This is my fifth visit here and my fourth with Paula. The last time we came we rented a villa for a couple of weeks in Ile Rousse from which we could look out over to the nearby harbour to see the ferrys arrive: it's almost certain that we would have seen the one that we arrived by this morning. And, conversely, when we disembarked it was sweet to see the villa, where we'd had a lovely time (as we have on all of our Corsica holidays). With our bags and party parked on the beach opposite the railway station, Zoe and I walked up to the lighthouse that I ran up to most mornings when we were here last. It's a pleasant stroll and you get terrific views out to sea and overland, and especially along the coast. The train journey from Ile Rousse to Calvi is also special. If the Famous Five ever took a train it was probably just like the ones that run along this line - they're small and old-fashioned (though quite smooth and comfortable) and they pass through (and on slow days stop at) numerous quaint little stations as they wend their way, pines bristling against the windows, along the dreamy unspoilt Balagne coastline. We should have packed ginger beer.
And finally, about 41 hours after leaving Dar Bennis, the taxis that we took from Calvi station (our bags were heavy!) arrived at Casa Paradis.
Calvi is a beautiful town by any standard. It has a picturesque citadel; a long sandy beach and clear blue seas; a sophisticated French harbour scene featuring chic cafes and fancy hi-tech boats alongside the tinkling masts of sail boats; and a back-drop of the verdant maquis rising up to granite mountains - all perfectly composed. This was not, however, my impression of the town when I first trudged into it many years ago. My friend Pete Brayshaw and I had just done the hard half of the GR20 and decided to spend our last few days before our return plane journey recuperating on the beach rather than doing a forced march through the forests of southern Corsica. After a week or so in the remote granite mountains meeting only the occasional goat-herd and, later in the day, other hikers who were throwing down a sleeping bag on the palettes of the refuges, I wasn't ready for Calvi. We caught the train (the same Famous Five line) from Vizzavona in the centre of the island and my first memory of walking through Calvi is of one of those seaside shops that sells postcards, inflatable sea toys and so forth. In contrast to where we'd been it seemed tacky. I soon got over it then, and now that I know the town much better I can see that it's pretty classy. But the experience burned a lingering subconscious note into my perception of Calvi that doesn't affect my view of any comparable Corsican coastal resorts; though mainly I'm over it, which is why we're here now.
I have an admission to make: this afternoon I didn't take any snaps of Calvi because I thought I could use stock footage from previous trips - then you could see that it really is a delightful place. But when I came to write this I found that I haven't transferred my Corsica photographs onto my mac. So while I was writing this, at about 8:35 pm, I stepped outside the villa and took a snap of the snow lying on the mountains across the bay:
Quite nice for 8:35 isn't it. The reason for snapping the snow is that when Pete and I did the walk we'd never been here before and naively adopted the advice of a book that we read that in April/May we should take an ice pick. This is completely nuts: the snow is purely decorative and although there is a "ski resort" on the GR20 it must have been set up in a moment of high optimism because there isn't any real snow. The ice pick, which was a Hunt & Hilary-era wooden model that we'd managed to borrow, just contributed significantly to pack weight, and probably also to the amusement of the other hikers.
This was all quite a while ago, though the freshness of memory seems to correlate poorly to the actual time passed. For example, a couple of days ago for some reason Zoe used the phrase, "Lah dee dah!". When she did this I immediately made a comment about Annie Hall (if you haven't seen it Diane Keaton plays a woman who uses this as something of a catch phrase) and told Zoe that it was one of my favourite films. Paula seemed very surprised, reporting that in all of the time she's known me, which dates back to around the time that Pete and I did the GR20, she's never heard me mention the film. While not doubting the truth of this I find it amazing - I think that I could describe very many scenes in the film accurately and, partly to see if I was right and partly just to see it again (and show Zoe the lah dee dah thing), I tried to buy the DVD at Gatwick. Of course they didn't have it.
So we spent the middle of the day having a beer, having lunch, looking at the beach and so on, passing time until we could join our bags in the villa. The villa is actually very nice with the right amount of space, all of which is usable, and it's a just couple of blocks away from the main drag and the beach. Perfect really. Later this afternoon I returned to the beach with Heidi and Zoe and we swam in the clear, shallow sea.
Having just left the wonderfully exotic Fes, I could easily have felt the same sense of deflation on entering this European resort that I felt when Pete and I walked into town all those years ago. Fortunately, I didn't. On the other hand, I don't feel that I've come back to a place that was more my home, and if I do it isn't because I'm in my home continent. It's certainly different from Fes here and I wouldn't even know where to begin enumerating the differences. The cultural differences are pretty stark - topless women on the beach v. veiled women in the medina, for example. And other differences stem from the fact that, like the UK, France has a per capita GDP about nine times that of Morocco.
I don't think I feel more affinity for the people here because we're all European. Should I? If I think of where I do feel affinity to the people of a nation other than England it has to be the US. In fact, from the point of view of human effectiveness, I was more comfortable communicating in French to people in Morocco than in France for the reasons I described previously. And one of the things that I like about Corsica is its independent spirit. I'm only reflecting on this today because of the way that the recent French and Dutch votes have drawn attention to the question of what sorts of institutional unity the people of Europe should seek. What seems interesting is not so much the rejections of the constitution in the two countries as the polar opposite reasons for the rejection (the French rejecting the treatment for its Anglo-Saxon free-market dilution and the Dutch for the stultifying effect of Eurocratic intervention on their economy, if my newspapers are to be believed). Can any of you articulate what it should feel like to be a European? I'm not asking for negative rhetorical purposes - I really think that there might be something there but I'm not exactly sure what it is. I have to say, though, that I have no more sense that I would develop friendships if I stayed long enough here than I had in Morocco, South Africa, Namibia, Botswana or Zambia, none of which has yet applied for membership of the EU.
As we were walking up to the lighthouse this morning Zoe said something that made me think that I'd had a dream last night about buying a motorbike - some sort of zippy 600cc Japanese job. While in Fes I believe that I had a dream featuring the track You're out of the Computer (thanks, Shaun). If so, it's only the second time that I can recall hearing a piece of music in a dream. The first, many years ago, was Second Line by Duke Ellington.
I was even sadder to leave Fes than I'd expected. I liked southern Africa just as much - and my guess is that we'll return sooner - but we didn't develop the attachment to one particular place that spending the entire month in Fes engendered. While you could see the essential sights in the Fes medina in a few days - and most visitors apparently do - there is a richer experience to be had picking through the medina's crazy streets each day for a month.
From Gatwick we flew to Marseilles, where we caught a huge ferry to Ile Rousse in Corsica. The journey took 12 hours and we had a cabin for the four of us. This is a good point to mention that we also had another cabin for Paula's parents, who have joined us for the first few days of our stay here and will be looking after Zoe and Heidi while Paula and I spend two weeks walking the GR20, a waymarked walk across the mountainous backbone of the island. More on the GR20 another time...
The ferry journey was great. We dined on board and after kicking around on deck to see the sunset retired to our cabin. When I'm doing night journeys on planes I sleep better when there's gentle turbulence to rock the plane (assuming I'm flying with a flat seat) and the motion of the boat across the sea had the same effect. And the best part was that we were arriving in Ile Rousse.
I love Corsica. This is my fifth visit here and my fourth with Paula. The last time we came we rented a villa for a couple of weeks in Ile Rousse from which we could look out over to the nearby harbour to see the ferrys arrive: it's almost certain that we would have seen the one that we arrived by this morning. And, conversely, when we disembarked it was sweet to see the villa, where we'd had a lovely time (as we have on all of our Corsica holidays). With our bags and party parked on the beach opposite the railway station, Zoe and I walked up to the lighthouse that I ran up to most mornings when we were here last. It's a pleasant stroll and you get terrific views out to sea and overland, and especially along the coast. The train journey from Ile Rousse to Calvi is also special. If the Famous Five ever took a train it was probably just like the ones that run along this line - they're small and old-fashioned (though quite smooth and comfortable) and they pass through (and on slow days stop at) numerous quaint little stations as they wend their way, pines bristling against the windows, along the dreamy unspoilt Balagne coastline. We should have packed ginger beer.
And finally, about 41 hours after leaving Dar Bennis, the taxis that we took from Calvi station (our bags were heavy!) arrived at Casa Paradis.
Calvi is a beautiful town by any standard. It has a picturesque citadel; a long sandy beach and clear blue seas; a sophisticated French harbour scene featuring chic cafes and fancy hi-tech boats alongside the tinkling masts of sail boats; and a back-drop of the verdant maquis rising up to granite mountains - all perfectly composed. This was not, however, my impression of the town when I first trudged into it many years ago. My friend Pete Brayshaw and I had just done the hard half of the GR20 and decided to spend our last few days before our return plane journey recuperating on the beach rather than doing a forced march through the forests of southern Corsica. After a week or so in the remote granite mountains meeting only the occasional goat-herd and, later in the day, other hikers who were throwing down a sleeping bag on the palettes of the refuges, I wasn't ready for Calvi. We caught the train (the same Famous Five line) from Vizzavona in the centre of the island and my first memory of walking through Calvi is of one of those seaside shops that sells postcards, inflatable sea toys and so forth. In contrast to where we'd been it seemed tacky. I soon got over it then, and now that I know the town much better I can see that it's pretty classy. But the experience burned a lingering subconscious note into my perception of Calvi that doesn't affect my view of any comparable Corsican coastal resorts; though mainly I'm over it, which is why we're here now.
I have an admission to make: this afternoon I didn't take any snaps of Calvi because I thought I could use stock footage from previous trips - then you could see that it really is a delightful place. But when I came to write this I found that I haven't transferred my Corsica photographs onto my mac. So while I was writing this, at about 8:35 pm, I stepped outside the villa and took a snap of the snow lying on the mountains across the bay:
Quite nice for 8:35 isn't it. The reason for snapping the snow is that when Pete and I did the walk we'd never been here before and naively adopted the advice of a book that we read that in April/May we should take an ice pick. This is completely nuts: the snow is purely decorative and although there is a "ski resort" on the GR20 it must have been set up in a moment of high optimism because there isn't any real snow. The ice pick, which was a Hunt & Hilary-era wooden model that we'd managed to borrow, just contributed significantly to pack weight, and probably also to the amusement of the other hikers.
This was all quite a while ago, though the freshness of memory seems to correlate poorly to the actual time passed. For example, a couple of days ago for some reason Zoe used the phrase, "Lah dee dah!". When she did this I immediately made a comment about Annie Hall (if you haven't seen it Diane Keaton plays a woman who uses this as something of a catch phrase) and told Zoe that it was one of my favourite films. Paula seemed very surprised, reporting that in all of the time she's known me, which dates back to around the time that Pete and I did the GR20, she's never heard me mention the film. While not doubting the truth of this I find it amazing - I think that I could describe very many scenes in the film accurately and, partly to see if I was right and partly just to see it again (and show Zoe the lah dee dah thing), I tried to buy the DVD at Gatwick. Of course they didn't have it.
So we spent the middle of the day having a beer, having lunch, looking at the beach and so on, passing time until we could join our bags in the villa. The villa is actually very nice with the right amount of space, all of which is usable, and it's a just couple of blocks away from the main drag and the beach. Perfect really. Later this afternoon I returned to the beach with Heidi and Zoe and we swam in the clear, shallow sea.
Having just left the wonderfully exotic Fes, I could easily have felt the same sense of deflation on entering this European resort that I felt when Pete and I walked into town all those years ago. Fortunately, I didn't. On the other hand, I don't feel that I've come back to a place that was more my home, and if I do it isn't because I'm in my home continent. It's certainly different from Fes here and I wouldn't even know where to begin enumerating the differences. The cultural differences are pretty stark - topless women on the beach v. veiled women in the medina, for example. And other differences stem from the fact that, like the UK, France has a per capita GDP about nine times that of Morocco.
I don't think I feel more affinity for the people here because we're all European. Should I? If I think of where I do feel affinity to the people of a nation other than England it has to be the US. In fact, from the point of view of human effectiveness, I was more comfortable communicating in French to people in Morocco than in France for the reasons I described previously. And one of the things that I like about Corsica is its independent spirit. I'm only reflecting on this today because of the way that the recent French and Dutch votes have drawn attention to the question of what sorts of institutional unity the people of Europe should seek. What seems interesting is not so much the rejections of the constitution in the two countries as the polar opposite reasons for the rejection (the French rejecting the treatment for its Anglo-Saxon free-market dilution and the Dutch for the stultifying effect of Eurocratic intervention on their economy, if my newspapers are to be believed). Can any of you articulate what it should feel like to be a European? I'm not asking for negative rhetorical purposes - I really think that there might be something there but I'm not exactly sure what it is. I have to say, though, that I have no more sense that I would develop friendships if I stayed long enough here than I had in Morocco, South Africa, Namibia, Botswana or Zambia, none of which has yet applied for membership of the EU.
As we were walking up to the lighthouse this morning Zoe said something that made me think that I'd had a dream last night about buying a motorbike - some sort of zippy 600cc Japanese job. While in Fes I believe that I had a dream featuring the track You're out of the Computer (thanks, Shaun). If so, it's only the second time that I can recall hearing a piece of music in a dream. The first, many years ago, was Second Line by Duke Ellington.
Posted: Mon - June 6, 2005 at 01:17 AM
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Published On: Feb 08, 2006 06:20 PM
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Published On: Feb 08, 2006 06:20 PM