Porto Vecchio - Bastia: The Corsican Menace

After the Vee Neck incident, it was pleasant to wake up to this:

[caption id="attachment_930" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="Porto Vecchio Sunrise"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_931" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="The Port at Porto Vecchio"][/caption]

If you're keeping tabs, then you'll know that this photo was taken the morning of Sunday, September 9th, five days in to the trip. Since it was Sunday, there was no pressure to be anywhere at a given time, and I had planned a long route through the island back to Bastia, where I would stay the night and take the ferry back to Livorno in the morning.

Little did I know that while the sun was on the east horizon, a pack of beasts lay lurking on my horizon. You got a glimpse of them in a previous post.

At one point, I turned a corner to find pigs on the left side of the road and cows on the right. With all this livestock running freely on the road their droppings became a serious hazard, because running through a significant amount of poop can cause a tire to slip, and no one wants to explain that they crashed a motorcycle by sliding on poop. My immediate reaction was to become annoyed, but then I became a little homesick because it reminded me of the Marina and the irresponsible dog owners who leave poop on the sidewalk.

Overall, the route offered some great riding and spectacular views, and I quickly forgot about the animals wandering the roads. I stopped only a few times to take some photos, because I was relying on the video camera for some good images. Here is what I got:

[caption id="attachment_932" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="Lac de l'Ospedale"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_934" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="Lac de l'Ospedale: Panoramic"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_933" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="Zonza: Monument aux Morts"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_935" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="Zonza: Panoramic"][/caption]

This is the restaurant where I had lunch; despite being part of France the name "U Mezzanu" is not French. It comes from the original Corsican language, and I'm pretty sure it means "The Mezzanine".

[caption id="attachment_937" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="U Mezzanu"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_936" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="Bastia Sunset"][/caption]

I really can't express how bummed I am that the video didn't turn out, because these pictures don't capture how beautiful the island really is.

In the next post, we head back to Italy and make haste for Tuscany in order to meet up with friends. Before that happens, though, we get an unexpected surprise on the ferry: Tao Beach.