A no-fly Mediterranean island-hopping adventure | Travel | guardian.co.

uk 30/07/2008 17:29

Mediterranean islands: 3, flights: 0

Richard Hammond takes the laid-back route to Corsica, Sardinia and Sicily on a no-fly
island-hopping adventure in the sun

Richard Hammond
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday July 30 2008

Checking in ... the port at Bonifacio, Corsica. Photograph: Richard Hammond

I was standing on the top deck of a ferry looking out across the Strait of Bonifacio that separates
Corsica and Sardinia. The sun was shining, the sky was perfect blue and the sea was calm. We soon
passed the headland and turned into the protected harbour at Santa Teresa di Gallura. Ferry trips
can be one long, stomach-churning pitch-and-roll, but this crossing had taken only 90 minutes and
it had been a pleasure: fresh sea air, clear views of Sardinia's historic coastline and near perfect
sailing conditions.

I'd taken the ferry to Sardinia because I didn't want to fly to the
Mediterranean. Cutting down on carbon was a factor, but I also
wanted the option of staying longer at a beach or a bar without
having to worry about rushing to catch the next connection. It's
ironic, the slower you travel the easier it is to be spontaneous,
even if that just means choosing to spend a few more hours
dozing in the sand dunes.

The overnight ferry from So I took the sleeper train to Nice to catch the ferry across the
Sardinia to Sicily. Photograph:
Richard Hammond Mediterranean with three islands in my sights. It looked on the
map like it could be a slog, but according to the timetables, it was
just a short hop to Corsica, a skip across to Sardinia and then one long jump over to Sicily.

The crossing from Nice to Bastia on Corsica took three hours,

Horses on Ghignu beach, Desert
des Agriates. Photograph: Richard
Hammond
Mediterranean. If you like your beaches hard-won, this is the way to do it.
and from there I headed west towards Ile Rousse, spending
the night at an "auberge ferme", where I was told about a
two-day walk along the beach-studded coastline of the Desert
des Agriates. My original plan had been to head immediately
inland to Corsica's mountains, en route to the island's
southern port at Bonifacio, but the weather was perfect and
the walk into the Desert des Agriates was too good to miss.
This truly is slow travel: a two-day trek along the desert's
40km rugged coastal path – the sentier de littoral – one of
the longest stretches of protected coastline in the

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I then travelled inland to Hotel Monte D'Oro, near Vizzavona,

Hotel Monte D'Oro, Corsica.
Photograph: Richard Hammond
the soldiers to raise the chapel to the ground and rebuild it as a mark of respect.
in the heart of the island's mountain range. It's one of the
oldest hotels in Corsica and oozes antiquity without being
ostentatious. There's a creaking old staircase with sepia
pictures on the walls, and an ivy-clad restaurant that serves
food from the owner's farm with a range of Corsican wines.
The owner's grandmother famously stood up to the Italian
soldiers who took over the hotel during the second world war.
She was furious that they had turned her small chapel at the
back of the hotel into a stable for their horses and made her
feelings known to a visiting Italian commander who ordered

After the short skip across from Corsica to Santa Teresa di

Gallura at the northern tip of Sardinia, I travelled inland to
the Supramonte mountains, staying for a couple of days at
Hotel Su Gologone, a stylish country hotel, designed by the
owner's daughter, with low-set, white-washed walls
overlooking rolling hills of vineyards and olive groves. There's
a spring-fed swimming pool, a gym, a museum of traditional
arts and crafts, and a large restaurant, which serves local
Hotel Su Gologone, Sardinia. specialities, such as sweet and sour wild boar roasted in front
Photograph: Richard Hammond
of the fire. The hotel is a few hundred yards from the
eponymous Su Gologone spring, the starting place for walks
into the Supramonte. The area is former bandit territory and the maze of confusing pathways means
it's easy to get lost, so I was advised to hire a guide who led me and two other guests for a morning's
hike into the Lanaittu Valley and up to a Bronze-Age village tucked into a cave near the top of
Tiscali mountain.

The long jump across to Palermo, Sicily, from Sardinia's

The ferry arriving art Palermo,
Sicily. Photograph: Richard
Hammond
southern port of Cagliari took about 15 hours, but I spent most
of it asleep in my cabin, and woke as we arrived in Palermo,
mid-morning in bright sunshine. I headed straight to Riserva
dello Zingaro, a nature reserve an hour west of the capital. Like
Corsica's Desert des Agriates, it's a protected area with several
stunning beaches that are off-limits to cars. A €2 entrance fee
ensures the upkeep of the seven-kilometre waymarked coastal
track that weaves in and out of hidden coves and wide sandy
beaches, with occasional deviations to large caves that provided
welcome shade in the midday sun.

I then spent four days at Il Paesino, a self-catering

Il Paesina agritourism, Sicily.
Photograph: Richard Hammond
agritourism just outside the ancient city of Syracuse in the
southeast of the island. Agritourisms range from those that
offer little more than a room at the back of the farmyard to
those that are more like a boutique hotel than a working
farm. Il Paesino is somewhere in between. The old farm
buildings have been converted into plush apartments, there's
a large olive grove, a swimming pool, and a restaurant that
serves meat and veg from nearby farms and local Sicilian
wine.

It's a 20-minute drive into Syracuse and the ancient city of Ortigia, once the capital of the
Mediterranean. I spent the day walking around the cobbled streets of this ancient city and my final
evening watching a performance of Agamemnon at Syracuse's Greek Theatre (in the remains of the
amphitheatre where it was first performed by the ancient Greeks), as the sun set over the bay.

The final leg of my journey involved taking the train back through Italy. Although it's just a few
kilometres from Sicily across the Straits of Messina to the mainland, the train is actually carried
across on a boat - a bizarre construction that scores zero points for carbon efficiency, but would
impress anyone who has ever owned a train set. There was talk some years ago about building a
bridge over the crossing, but the idea was ruled too dangerous because the area has a long history of
seismic activity. After boarding the train, the two halves separated and slid onto the ferry's rail tracks
separately, grinding to a halt, side by side, in the belly of the boat. The crossing took just forty
minutes then the trains re-joined and we sped off along the Italian coast up to Rome.

The whole trip had taken just over two weeks, yet it wasn't the slog it had looked on paper. Boarding
the ferries had been hassle-free, the boats had been clean and punctual, and I'd had the freedom to

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the ferries had been hassle-free, the boats had been clean and punctual, and I'd had the freedom to
cross the islands at my own pace. I'm planning to cross the islands again, only next time I intend to
carry on to Malta. For a no-fly, island-hopping adventure in the sun, the Mediterranean now feels a
lot closer to home.

Getting there

Train from London to Paris costs from £59 return and the sleeper from Paris to Nice costs from £30
single in a six-berth couchette (raileurope.co.uk, 0844 848 4070).

Ferry from Nice to Bastia costs from €29 (£22.80) (corsicaferries.com). Ferry from Bonifacio to
Santa Teresa di Gallura from €13.22 (£10.40) (aferry.co.uk).

Ferry from Cagliani to Palermo costs from €93.07 (£73.25) for a single bed (tirrenia.it). Train from
Messina to Rome costs from £39 single and the sleeper from Rome to Paris costs from £42.50 single
in a 6-berth couchette (raileurope.co.uk, 0844 848 4070).

A night at Su Gologone costs from £79 per person half board and a week at Il Paesino costs from
£690 including car hire based on two sharing (long-travel.co.uk, +44 (0)1694 722193).

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