Camilla Ransom
We woke up this morning desperate to give the paddleboards a first proper try out. If we do say so ourselves, we were surprisingly pretty good. We put this down to the fact our balancing skills have been honed through living on the boat. We got straight to our feet and off we pottered around the anchorage. Going nowhere fast and probably with a dreadful technique we managed only to fall in twice, and for the remainder of the hour we practiced going up and down wind and turning around. It’s heaps of fun! We’re a long way off being able to go to the beach fully dressed for a sundowner, but that’s the goal 🙂
In the afternoon we debated whether to walk the 5km into Bonafacio, or whether to be lazy and hang out on the boat. Having heard such great things it’s a town we couldn’t miss so we went ashore (in the dinghy 😉 ) and walked for an hour or so along a lovely (very hilly and rocky) tree-lined path. It came to an end and within a few minutes we were at the marina which was like nothing we’ve ever seen. It lies in a large deep inlet nestled between two hills (from the outside it’s all but invisible) with steep cliff edges either side. It’s really quite dramatic. We walked alongside the bustling marina, past some very expensive looking boats (and women!) and past a long line of restaurants to where we could walk up to see the sea. It was so high up there that even the huge square-rigged boat (probably 100m long) looked like a matchbox toy. Before heading down we walked through the castle at the maze of streets and houses perched on the hillside. Before tackling the long walk home we stopped for coffee and pancakes and within an hour and a half we were back on the boat, really pleased we’d made the effort.
