Palombaggia
Altea
Sun 10 Aug 2014 21:43
41:33:30N 09:19:55E
23 July 2014
When I was 16, I had an exchange visit with a french boy, Philippe Chabert, who lived in Paris. He was the son of Giles Chabert, who my father had met on business. We entertained Philippe in Huddersfield and then took him on holiday with us to Scotland, where he photographed sheep.
In return, I went to Paris and Corsica. I always thought that I got the good end of that deal.
I remember being picked up from the airport by Philippe's girlfriend, in a Fiat 500 with bull bars front and rear. In the city, she parked behind a BMW and when we returned to the car a little later, another car had parked close behind. No problem. She bumped into the car in front, then the one behind, then the one in front etc etc until she had enough room, and off we went. Very exotic. I always wanted a Fiat 500 after that.
After a week or so in Paris I then went with the family on holiday in a villa in Corsica, where I went spear fishing, drank green Chartreuse, and got very sunburned. Anyway, the point of the story is that we had stayed somewhere close to Porto Vecchio, and one of the names I recalled was Palombaggia. I remembered it as a pristine stretch of white sand and turquoise sea, with brilliant green umbrella pines along the shore and, in my mind's eye, palm trees - but that may just be a trick of the memory 40 years on.
Memories of that holiday and another, taken in 2001, with the boys, had been a strong draw to Corsica this year and I was looking forward to revisiting Palombaggia.
We sailed round and had a generator and water making run along the way, topped up the batteries and the water tank, and ran the washing machine.
The idea had been to visit the beach for a lunch stop and then carry on round to Porto Vecchio. The beach was as I remembered, but no longer deserted. There was a good choice of restaurants and a nice family atmosphere with kids playing in the water that was, for the first time this trip, lovely and warm.
We parked the dinghy at one of a group of small buoys laid for the purpose just off the beach, and ate a long and very pleasant meal at the beach restaurant that had been canny enough to provide them.
With a rosy glow, we walked along the beach, and bought a couple of sets of bat and ball from the looky looky man. We are clearly out of practice at bat and ball. J and I could not get to 50 consecutive hits, and L launched herself into the sea in a desperate attempt to return one of S's drives.
All this took longer than we had planned and we decided just to stay at anchor for the night. It was a bit rolly, but safe and the view was spectacular.