Week 3 – Thursday July 15 – Sagone

Ajaccio's claim to fame is as the birthplace of Napoleon. He was born on the 15th of August 1759. Napoleon was born in Corsica to parents on noble Italian ancestry and trained as an artillery officer in mainland France. Bonaparte rose to prominence under the First French Republic and led successful campaigns against the various European Coalitions that were fighting against France. In 1799, he staged a Coup and installed himself as First Consul; five years later the French Senate proclaimed him Emperor. In the first decade of the nineteenth centure, the French Empire under Napoleon engaged in a series of conflicts - the Napoleonic Wars - involving every major European power. After a series of victories, France secured a dominant position in continental Europe, and Napoleon maintained the French sphere on influence through the formation of extensive alliances and the appointment of friends and family members to rule other European countries as French client states.

The French invasion of Russia in 1812 marked a turning point in Napoleon's fortunes. His army was badly defeated in the campaign and never fully recovered. In 1813, another coalition countries who had tired of having their noses bloodied by this power hungry little Frenchman, defeated his forces at Leipzip; the following year the Coalition invaded France, forced Napoleon to abdicate and exiled him to the island of Elba. Less than a year later, he escaped Elba and returned to power, but was defeated at the Battle of Waterloo in June 1815. Napoleon spent the last 6 years of his life in confinement by the British on the island of Saint Helena. An autopsy concluded he died of stomach cancer, though scientists have since conjectured he was poisoned with arsenic.

Today was just a short drive to Sagone about 40ks north of Ajaccio for a couple of nights camping to use as a base to do some site-seeing around the coast. This campground is very big, with a restaurant and swimming pool and we have a great shaded site at the back of the campground. The campground like all of them comes recommended by a book that we have and at first appearances, it seems quirk free – toilets with seats and paper, shower cubicles with all the right space and cubicle layout, showers separated from toilets, a fully functioning laundromat with a washer and dryer – could it be perfection. Then it happened........ Hi day Hi, Cammm Pears..... ok, it wasn't that bad, but it did have a sing-a-long by the pool from 8:30pm (which we were fortunately mostly out of earshot of), the running bus at 8:30 and aqua jogging at 9:30.

Anyway, we set up our camp without drama then headed into Sagone for lunch. Despite being the high season, Sagone was largely empty and each of the four restaurants on the beach only had one couple in each and none of the beach attractions – jetskis, hobbie cats etc – were doing any business. We've felt all the way around that the place was quiet, but we are now into the high season and it was a shock to see how quiet things were.

Returning to the campground in the heat of the afternoon, we headed for the pool. We must have raised the average age of the pool dwellers by 10 years with our arrival and were probably the oldest people there. That is when we saw the worst site we have seen from a cyclist ever. We had seen these two guys arrive on their tandem bike towing their little trailer, but in non matching outfits. Fortunately, they were doing the right things on their bikes and wearing black cycling shorts, but luggage constraints had obviously precluded them from being able to fit swimming togs in, so instead they had resorted to wearing their underpants, their grey underpants, their grey see-through when wet underpants. And when I say see-through, do I mean see-through. I'm surprised they weren't arrested.

Anyway, having got through that shock, we had a very informal meal by our tent of provisions we had bought from the supermarket next door. As the sun set, the frogs started croaking, and croak they did until the sun came up the next morning. It's actually quite a mesmerising sound if there's an army of them, which there was, so the didn't effect our sleep as much as the sleep aoepnea patient in the tent in the next pitch.