Another of the nice things about Calvi is that you can get back on board the little train you came on, and use it to visit some of the picturesque spots along the coast to the north-east.




1.
Ile-Rousse

This is a Pascal Paoli town.


He keeps cropping up, this guy. No trip to Corsica works, it seems, without coming to grips with his legacy. And it's an interesting tale of betrayed ideals. Paoli was just four when the Corsicans began their rebellion against the Genoese in 1729, and his father was one of the leaders of the insurrection. It drags on. It's not until 1755 that Genoa gives in, and the Corsican Republic is proclaimed under Pascal Paoli (and even then, Calvi, Bonifacio, and other pockets remain under Genoese control). In Corte, Paoli's capital, he establishes a printing press, a courthouse, and a university. But more than this, he brings in a remarkably far-sighted constitution. Rousseau and Voltaire, among others, take an interest in what is an "unprecedented political experiment": A Republic, standing out like a beacon in an age of monarchies.

Of course, it doesn't last. Well, it lasts 14 years. In May 1769, Paoli and his troops have to give way to the army of Louis XV of France. Paoli is forced into exile, and heads for London, attracting the attention of the whole of Enlightenment Europe en route.

But the wheel of history turns again. Twenty years later, Paoli is watching the monarchy that expelled him from his homeland totter and collapse. In 1789, France puts in place what Paoli tried to do in Corsica 30 years earlier. He is full of admiration. This is the kind of state that Corsica can join, he feels, and the island officially becomes part of France in that first year of the Revolution. On 22 April 1790, Paoli is welcomed as a hero by the National Constituent Assembly.

But good things can very quickly go bad, and the grip the French Republic exerts over Corsica proves to be little different from that of the Ancien Regime. So Paoli turns to the English.

Which is where -- finally -- Ile-Rousse comes into it. It's in Ile-Rousse that Sir Gilbert Eliot and two military advisers land in January 1794 (Calvi, Bastia, and Saint Florent being full of French Republicans). "Their arrival," says Dorothy Carrington, "was wonderful. Crowds of Corsicans... accompanied them on their long walk over the mountains to Paoli's headquarters at Murato; in every village they were greeted with volleys of gunfire and cries of 'Viva Paoli e la nazione Inglese'." It was decided that Corsica should be governed by a Viceroy appointed by the King of England. Whether Paoli was totally in agreement with this provision is doubtful, but his position was weak. He had the French against him, and also the Corsican Jacobins.

And who would not have foreseen that both Eliot and Paoli would want to be the Viceroy...? While they were waiting for the King's pronouncement, however, there were battles to fight, and French-held ports to be captured. Siege had to be laid to Bastia, and then to Calvi.

As well as holding rival ambitions, the two men were also at odds ideologically. Eliot found Paoli's political speeches "absurd and crude". He adds: "Paoli seems to me to have strong tendencies to democracy." Dear Lord, that won't do...

Given Eliot's misgivings, Paoli achieves a surprising amount (a national parliament, elected positions...). But then the thing all falls apart. Paoli resents Eliot's eventual appointment as Viceroy. There's a bust-up over a bust bust. (Sorry, can't resist -- and the thing's so ridiculous that a pun seems appropriate. Paoli's supporters have circulated a rumour that their man's bust has been deliberately smashed by Eliot's aide-de-camp in Ajaccio -- and all this even without social media...)

As we've already seen, the Anglo-Corsican Kingdom didn't last long... And Paoli found himself back in exile in England. Poor man.

But back to Ile-Rousse...






Paoli founded the town during the time of the Corsican Republic. According to Antoine-Claude Valery, the aim was to draw the population from the mountains, and to act as one in the eye for Algajola and Calvi, who were still devoted to Genoa. Building started in the teeth of attacks from land and sea by the Genoese, who were keen to prevent the work progressing. Valery finds it a pretty little town, despite being constructed under the sound of the cannon, and despite having what he regards as a silly name.





Carrington, on the other hand, is much more scathing: "In the manner of heads of new nations Paoli planned it from scratch, laid out its first streets, three of them, running parallel... Born of the will of one man, Ile-Rousse still seems alien to its setting... Improvements carried out since then by municipalities anxious to do justice to their founder have merely emphasized the artificiality of the place: the covered marketplace with a peristyle on the lines of a classical temple, added under Louis Philippe, the overlarge main square planted with planes... Paoli's town came to imitate a minor resort of the French Riviera of the interwar years."

I think she's being terribly unfair. OK, the market is a little OTT:


But the square is lovely:






2.
Algajola

A couple of days later, we took the train to another little town, about half-way between Ile-Rousse and Calvi.

This was originally a Genoese fortified town (the last to be built, after Bonifacio, Calvi, Bastia, Saint-Florent, and Ajaccio). During the wars of independence in the 1700s, it went backwards and forwards between Genoa and the rebels.

Carrington refers to its "collapsing Genoese fortress". In 1837, Valery writes: "Algajola has been practically abandoned since the foundation of Ile-Rousse. The sight inspires a singular sadness; one believes oneself entering a city that has been taken by storm, and whose inhabitants have disappeared."

It's quiet at this time of year, for sure. The bakery is being refurbished; the small supermarkets marked on the map don't seem to exist any more. There are a couple of cafes if you have time to sit for a while. But we were on a bit of a timetable, as we wanted to catch the 12.06 train back.

You can absolutely not complain, however, about Algajola's picturesqueness:
















Pleasant excursions. Very pleasant.