Corsica Travel Guide: Beaches, Canyoning and Natural Pools

We spent three weeks exploring Corsica, from the beaches of Ajaccio to Cervione and the iconic coastline near Porto-Vecchio. In this episode, we share our favorite beaches, the hidden natural pools inland, and the adrenaline rush of canyoning. Whether you’re planning a Corsica itinerary or just dreaming of your next Mediterranean escape, this episode is packed with real experiences, travel tips, and the best things to do in Corsica. Read more about Corsica here.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello and welcome back. I'm Lisa and I'm Erin. And this is the Getaways Podcast. Hi. Shall we tell them?

SPEAKER_00 0:12

Okay, we got some exciting news.

SPEAKER_01 0:15

We've been working on something because we love doing this podcast, but we also love so many different things. So we want to share another version of it.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

I'm I like more creepy things. So I always look into haunted stuff when we go to locations. So we've started a podcast called The Haunted Getaways.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

And it is launching this week on Thursday, right?

SPEAKER_00 0:34

Yep. Two episodes come out on Thursday, one about Venice and one about a hotel in Cornwall, England. So they're bite-sized versions of true stories of actual hauntings in locations that we travel to.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

And in, you know, we're starting with like Airbnbs and hotels and places that you would go on a trip. I'm starting to narrate. Aaron will do it eventually. But we hope you love it and we'd love to have you give it a shot and hear what you think.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

Yes. So in in, you know, during your breaks, quick drives, if you've got just 10 minutes to spare, these are for you.

SPEAKER_01 1:05

All right. Let us know what you think, guys. And let's jump into the other one, which we're talking about Corsica today.

SPEAKER_00 1:10

Yep, we're gonna stick with our summer because we cannot wait for summer to get here. It's cold again in the Netherlands. Shocking.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Um, although it has been drier, they said, than any other spring in history, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:23

Yeah, we're kind of having a drought in some like in a few of the regions in the Netherlands, they're having to start like some water precautions because it has not rained in a while. All right, Corsica. Corsica.

SPEAKER_01 1:38

So we spent three weeks there, not this past summer, but 2023, right? Yeah. Okay. So three weeks, three different places, three different houses to try and sort of cover the island.

SPEAKER_00 1:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

But first, okay, so let's talk about Corsica in general. It is an island off of France, like between France and Italy.

SPEAKER_00 1:56

It's much closer to Italy.

SPEAKER_01 1:57

And it has gone back and forth from a lot of ownership. Like it was Italian, it was German, it was French, and currently is French.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

Yes, it still has a lot of Italian influence. Because it's right, it's literally like just on top of Sardinia. So it's the same vibe, it's the same, it's pretty much Italian food, wouldn't you say?

SPEAKER_01 2:21

It's yeah, it's a little bit of a combination of versions. It's a fusion, I think, of of French, Italian, and Mediterranean in general, right?

SPEAKER_00 2:32

Yeah. It's we took a ferry, a tragetto to get there. We left out of Livorno in Tuscany, and it was only four hours.

SPEAKER_01 2:40

Yeah, not bad at all.

SPEAKER_00 2:41

So it was much cheaper. It was it wasn't that bad. We just got three seats. Rex kind of like just laid on the floor in front of us, and you know, we just watched movies and played on our iPads for four hours. Lisa did get very dizzy. She tends to get a little of the old what's it called?

SPEAKER_01 2:59

Vertigo. Because since COVID, for some reason, I get vertigo really badly and um and you know, boats, especially. But anyway, okay, so the first our first stop. Our first stop was A Giocchio. Very Italian names. Which we stayed in an Airbnb kind of well, first of all, Ajaccio is like a fairly big city, right? And so we stayed probably what a 10-minute drive from the sea.

SPEAKER_00 3:26

Yeah, but when she says big city, it's like you know, it's like a little town. Yeah, for an island. We stayed about, yeah, a 10-minute walk from the sea in an apartment. That was it was nice.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

It was fine, yeah. And then um, so we could I could walk wrecks down in the morning and we walked along the sea. There was a little path, and so that was nice. And then obviously there's beaches further, all along, further, yeah, further down.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

So there were there were a lot of beaches within what, like 45-minute drive?

SPEAKER_01 3:56

Yeah, at the most, right?

SPEAKER_00 3:57

Yeah, like there were some closest to us that we would go to was called uh Marinella Beach, and it was about probably like a 10 to 15 minute drive. The beaches there are great. There was a lot of waves. Remember that one beach that like we couldn't even dip our toe in such big waves.

SPEAKER_01 4:14

That was like kind of scary big waves, which is really unusual.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

Yeah, so we went to that beach, and then um there was a bunch of that beach was called Capo di Feno. So just if you want to see some waves, because Dylan took up skim boarding in Corsica, so he liked the sandy beaches with no waves, so we had to find a lot of those, which uh Mare Esole, I think was the one we went to the most where we'd take wrecks. Yeah, and then there was one up north that we went to really good lunch at a like a beach hut on the beach, like a beach hut restaurant.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

It felt very tropical. It was like you know, like palm trees around, and the restaurant was just super cute.

SPEAKER_00 4:55

And I think that one was called Barbicalla. How would you say that?

SPEAKER_01 4:59

That's got the old Spanish influence in the name, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_00 5:02

Barbicalla Beach. But it is beautiful, it was uh kind of protected, and so there weren't very many people there.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

Yeah, yeah, because I was surprised we could even yeah, but I was surprised we could get into the restaurant because it was so cute and really, really good, and there was hardly anybody there.

SPEAKER_00 5:21

Yeah. So those were our main beaches. We kind of stuck to the same beaches or area of beaches on this part of the trip.

SPEAKER_01 5:28

Yeah. Um, but that was far from all we did in a jacky because the whole center of the island is very, very lush and full of water and rivers and streams and boulder climbing and all sorts of fun stuff. So Dylan and I went canyoning. Now I'm old and I was probably probably the after me, the oldest person was probably in their 20s. Um, and I also have a double hip replacement. So that part was fun, but it was really, really beautiful. We had we wore wetsuits and we went on natural uh water slides into these pools. And um, yeah, highly recommend if you're up for an adventure, canyoning in Corsica is amazing. I did not go. I don't know that, you know, you it is very, very physical. So if you're not down for that, you shouldn't do it. But it is if you are, it's really, really fun. It's really beautiful and something I'd never done before. Like the natural slides, I mean, we probably slid down five rocks into pools. Like it was it was really fun and really cool. Would you do it again? You know, physically it was a lot with with trying because because of my double hip replacement, I can't always step up the way that I need to. And so that was hard getting over rocks and stuff. But if if taking that out of the equation, I would do it a million more times. So the other good part about the middle of the island and all of the water and places to walk around and explore is there was so many places for Rex to swim.

SPEAKER_00 7:08

So there were a lot of swimming holes that we took Rex to that were really cool.

SPEAKER_01 7:12

Yeah, and really nice too that because there were so many that we could go out um and not really worry about the heat because he could just jump in the water anytime he wanted. So that was a fun thing. Rex is right here.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

He's like, What are you guys doing? Okay, so that was our first week. And then the second week, we drove across the island back to the east side and down to about the middle of the coast to a place called Cervione, and we stayed in it was like a apartment village, wouldn't you say? Yeah, there was probably what like six apartments. Oh, was that it? Yeah, and they had like a restaurant in the uh the complex, and it was a tiny, tiny apartment.

SPEAKER_01 7:57

It was with a tiny, tiny kitchen. Um, but we were right on the beach.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

On the beach, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:04

And the cool thing about the little building that we were in was that the restaurant downstairs was lovely, and they made a big, huge Spanish influence again. Made a big, huge, enormous vat of paella.

SPEAKER_00 8:17

Yeah, they had paella night during the week.

SPEAKER_01 8:20

And so good, and so like it felt very communal, didn't it? I mean, it felt like a you know, it was family-owned, and um, it felt like everybody comes there for a paella night, and it was really cool and fun and delicious.

SPEAKER_00 8:33

Now, I will say, because we were where we were location-wise, and the beach, we didn't go to any other beaches other than the beach outside of our house.

SPEAKER_01 8:44

It was really lovely though, and we could go like Rex and I would walk all the way down. There was um kind of a hotel resort just down from us, and um, and they had a bar on the beach, they had a lovely beach, restaurants, everything. In fact, I had to go there and use the Wi-Fi because the Wi-Fi in our apartment was terrible. Um, so whenever I had meetings, I had to go to that hotel. But the the beach was lovely. There's a whole huge grassy area that Rexy could play in. Um, it was a nice it was very nice.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

I I'll put the apartment that we stayed in and that hotel on the website. But I what well I will say is not just the Wi-Fi is bad, the internet is terrible in this location.

SPEAKER_01 9:28

Yeah, you don't have data.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

So keep that in mind. It's nice if you don't have to work because it's nice to just shut off, I think.

SPEAKER_01 9:36

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:37

But we we just stayed at this beach. I mean, we really didn't go anywhere.

SPEAKER_01 9:41

No, there it was, there were a lot of places to walk though, because remember then we would walk up towards like the main road, and there was a lot of walking up there. There were a lot of services in the area too, like big grocery stores, lots of other restaurants, everything you could need if you, you know, just you don't need your car once you get there.

SPEAKER_00 9:58

Correct.

SPEAKER_01 9:59

You know, like I said, it's the place you go when you want to just unplug, and you know, you can walk to everything unless you know you're buying big grocery stores, then you might need a car just to take stuff back. Yeah. But um, but everything pretty much at your fingertips, except except the where rest of the world without internet.

SPEAKER_00 10:17

The beach is beautiful. There is a a food truck right on the beach that had the best pizzas.

SPEAKER_01 10:24

Great pizzas.

SPEAKER_00 10:24

We went back on our way home to get pizzas there. It was the best pizza.

SPEAKER_01 10:29

And it was nice because they had also set up a seating area right on the sand. So so you'd get your food or you know, order, then go sit down and they'd bring you your food. So it was it was the it was a mobile restaurant, really, right?

SPEAKER_00 10:40

Yeah, it was great, which was great. So that was a week of just lounging, which I enjoyed. And then we drove south on the same, the east side, to just above Porto Vecchio, which Porto Vecchio is a one of the bigger towns in Corsica, and Port City, you could come in there, yeah. Yeah, it's Bastia, which is the biggest, and then Porto Vecchio is where the ferries all come in. And we stayed in this townhouse, is that what it would be called? I guess so, yeah. We shared a wall with one house, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:13

But it was one single story, decent size, big yard, big yard, air conditioning in all the rooms, which was lovely, huge kitchen.

SPEAKER_00 11:21

Yeah, like we had no complaints about that house. No, not at all. So we were about a seven or eight minute drive from one of the most beautiful beaches I've ever been to, or at least one of the most beautiful beaches on Corsica. Right. And we went to that every day. And then we were also about a 10 to 15 minute drive from the um they c they're called like the swimming pools of Kavu, but it's uh a natural swimming pool in the center of the island.

SPEAKER_01 11:49

It's another like lake river offshoot with natural slides again and tons of hiking, exploring, walking, and water along along the way almost entirely. And it was crowded. It was crowded, yeah. It was crowded. Um but yeah, so Rex went with us a few times just for exercise up there, and then we left him at home one time and went all the way to the pools, and then Dylan and I swam in the in the pools down there, and it's it's really, really lovely. Um, definitely need water shoes. Yes. Um, you probably actually want to wear them the whole way so that you know you can walk on the sand.

SPEAKER_00 12:33

Um but the hike to get to the pool is beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

It is, it's about 45 minutes, yeah. Right. I mean, it's not it's not quick, but it's worth it. And like I said, there's water the whole way. So if you get too crazy hot, you can dip your toes in the water on the way. Um, but the pools are definitely worth seeing and worth exploring.

SPEAKER_00 12:51

So yeah, so that was really nice. And then the beach near our house was called Pen Pen Penerello, Penerello. Penarello, yeah. And it was so shallow. Like it was shallow for what a good hundred meters, at least. It was like shallow, like you could walk on your knees far, but and then it dropped off pretty quick, didn't it? Or did it not have a lot of it?

SPEAKER_01 13:14

I'm never dropping off, but but definitely quicker than you swam off to this the boats, and you were definitely swimming. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:21

Um, and the it's a long beach, so we we'd start at different locations. It had services on the beach. It was not ever super crowded, but it was so beautiful because and because it's so shallow, it was one of those like turquoise. It's like it's like the pictures you see. It was like the turquoise clear water, so nice. I loved it. And we'd go there every night after dinner because there was wood like a forest right in front of it, and we would walk wrecks and let them go off leash a little bit and run around corners and stuff. So that was really fun. But we went there every day, and then we went to San Julia, yeah, plage de Saint Julia. Plage is a French word, right? Yeah, so we went to Saint Julia is not yes, so it's a little French Italian beach, which was a it was a nice beach. It had a lot of it had like uh jet ski rentals, boat rentals, all sorts of rentals, and it was crowded, yeah, but definitely more like family event beach, yes, yes, and then we also wanted to try a different beach a little further north, and so we drove and just kind of we had seen it driving in, remember? Yeah, and so we drove up and we found a restaurant that we wanted to eat at. So we ate at this restaurant and it was really good. We ate on the second story, and then we just walked across the street and went to the sea there, and it was so nice. It was beautiful, and that beach was called Plage de Fatih.

SPEAKER_01 14:43

Wow, throwing down the French accent.

SPEAKER_00 14:46

Um I'm French now.

SPEAKER_01 14:48

No, but that beach was great. I love that beach.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

Yeah, so we we stayed pretty local there too. This was definitely not like our usual beach trips where we venture out every day to different beaches.

SPEAKER_01 14:58

Yeah, but we didn't really need to because we had things that we loved really close. And that's not to say that's not true of Sardinia, but there's so much to explore in Sardinia, and I felt like we got a good taste of everything by sticking fairly close to the three places we stayed. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

But yeah, no, that was Oh, we went into Porto Vecchio for a day and walked around and shopped around. It's cute, it's a cute little beach town.

SPEAKER_01 15:21

Yeah, yeah. And that's, I mean, I guess we goes without saying for all of these places, there's little villages where you know you can do shopping and grab food and whatever. So it's not, it's not like it's just the beach and that's it. There's there's always a little a little village or little town to walk around.

SPEAKER_00 15:36

I will say Porto Vecchio felt a little more upscale than a Giachchio and Bastia.

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Right. No, for sure. Which Bastia was our our last before catching the ferry back to the mainland. Um, but it was cute.

SPEAKER_00 15:50

Yeah. Bastia is really cute, it's really cute. Um, we drove up from Porto Vecchio on our last day because our ferry left at like 10 at night, and typically you have to be out by 10 in the morning from the Airbnbs in Italy and France. So we drove up, we stopped at our favorite pizza place, and then we went to Bastia. We got a day room that we all three just shared, put our stuff down. Rexy too. And Rexy. So we walked around the town, we had dinner out, we just kind of chilled in the room until it was time to drive to the tragetto, which was right across the street. So it was really nice. I really enjoyed Bastia. It reminded me of Bergamo.

SPEAKER_01 16:27

Well, and it's had that big like park, community park in the middle, um, where everybody was just sort of having gelato and hanging out. Because it was hot, it was really hot, it was a hot summer, and that was the one thing that um well, it's hard to also have no home for 10 hours while you're waiting for the ferry, but also to be able to go into an air-conditioned room and have a bathroom. Yeah, like that's and non-negotiable for us. Well, and somewhere for Rex, because Rex doesn't want to just walk around in the heat for 10 hours, right? Yeah. So that was the the thinking behind the day room because it's just it just gives you a home base for for the hours that you need it.

SPEAKER_00 17:05

Yeah, yeah. So then we got on the truck ghetto. This time we didn't take the four hour, we took the overnight to Genoa. Which at the end of the day, I think we should have taken the four hour and just driven through Tuscany.

SPEAKER_01 17:21

See, I think it's easier to just sleep on the boat.

SPEAKER_00 17:24

It is. It is. Yeah. Genoa's a shorter drive to get back to the Netherlands than Lavorno. So right.

SPEAKER_01 17:33

So it's just uh, you know, you would you rather spend more time on the boat or more time in the car?

SPEAKER_00 17:37

And by the end of our trips, we're ready to just get home than drive another four days.

SPEAKER_01 17:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:43

Um, uh okay. So would you go back to Corsica? Absolutely. And is there anything you would do differently?

SPEAKER_01 17:49

Um, well, I hate to say it, but because I work everywhere I go, the internet was really a problem. Um, so I would be more prepared for that. Um but besides that, I don't think so. I really liked everywhere we went. Like I said before, I love the ability to have something else to do, like in the middle of the island and and have the walks available and the swimming in fresh water and all of that I think is is really cool. The food's great there.

SPEAKER_00 18:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:21

Um, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:23

I mean, I wouldn't say no to going back, but it definitely wouldn't be on the top of my list of where I would want to go back. Like I put Sardinia Sicily, Puglia, Croat. I put all that above Corsica. All right. Fair enough. Uh so next week we'll be talking more summer. More summer. In the meantime, check us out on Thursday on the Haunted Getaways, wherever you listen to podcasts. Check out our website, www.thegetaways with a Z.com.

SPEAKER_01 18:51

And thanks for listening. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and review. And we will see you next time. Bye. Thank you. Bye.