We arose this morning to rain, the first majorly grumpy day in the holiday so far. Oh dear, thinks I, for Hubby's birthday to be ruined was not in my plans! We do birthday cards over our first breakfast at the dining table inside our cabin, the balcony looking a bit drowned for now. By the time we emerged from shaving however, the rain had stopped although the sky was still hugely overcast.
In the absence of plan B, the inevitable tender ashore was quite rough, but once firmly on Terroir Franca we put best foot forward into an increasingly lovely, albeit humid day. Heading out the mysteriously renamed D513 (to D313) ascended some 270m to the pleasant village of Corbara which was half closed, but lovely despite that. We saw the outside of the closed museum, the closed church and a building site, before finding some extraordinary view-points, and the Monastery of Seven Regrets, possibly the the first of which was building it so bloody high on a cliff side!
We headed back down the road until we passed a place where on the ascent we'd witnesses an amazing dog herding about 300 goats, without human intervention, along paths, across the road and down the hillside onto another path. We decided to take their lead and follow the same path coastwards. As we descended though a Beverly Hills style area of impressive houses fastened to the hill-side, we soon got back onto the D313 to continue our walk, and quickly ended up on the pathway side-by-side with a railway track. We followed this heading, as planned, back to L'Isle Rousse. As we passed a couple of idyllic beaches we thought the track had veered off but no, we soon found it again, until suddenly we were close to the waters edge, just inches separating us from granit Valhalla and the track was safely up the hill-side away from us. We picked our way carefully across the headland and enjoyed the most stunning scenery and flora together with beautiful Aqua seas, until the path ran into the bay, we re-plotted and followed another steeply banked route until, it emerged right next to the railway.
The last half-mile or so was spent actually walking in the railway bed, something that in Britain would get one arrested, but this is France - yet I still hesitated to "arrive on platform 2" and/or suffer the ignominy of being shouted at by the station master, so we escaped back via suburbia just before we reached the station!
We then headed over to the light house and continued our trek by climbing up to this, past the ferry port, before returning to town and our tender back home. All in 13.25 wonderful miles, relatively easy compared to the previous day!
On arrival back home we spent two hours on deck five aft in pool and jacuzzi, with almost no other guests, how it must be like on a private yatch, just loving the solitude. Then it was time to dress for dinner, doing presents and getting extra champagne to wash down the caviar! We visiting the tasting restaurant tonight, and finally another great company show offering, these talented young performers have a lot to offer!
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