LONDON AND THE MED 2025

Day 32. Corfu

Our tour today was supposed to take us to the highlights of Corfu. After driving through miles of ramshackled buildings, a quarter of which appeared to be abandoned before completion and the remainder which had never seen a lick of paint, apart from graffiti, since their construction, we finally got into the countryside where it seems a common practice to dump rubbish along the roadside.

Eventually we arrived at Paleokastritsa which our guide had told us had the most beautiful beaches on the island. She did correct this slightly on our arrival by adding the fact you had to take a boat to see them. So we had a half an hour’s free time. All the shops were shut. The tiny beach looked very dirty though the water was crystal clear. You couldn’t stand anywhere near the narrow main road as you were in grave danger of being rundown so we retreated up a dirt road near where the bus had stopped and waited amongst the abandoned boat trailers, rubbish and tall weeds till it was time to move on.

Our next highlight was a view of Mouse Island. This was pretty enough I guess, though 95% of the available viewing space had been sold off to private restaurants so unless you were prepared to order a meal, only around four people could see the view at any time.

This area is called Kanoni after a French cannon battery that was located here in the 19th century. Only one cannon remains today. The reason why Mouse Island is considered a highlight is that when the Greek Government first decided way back to encourage international tourism to Greece, the very first brochure they produced had only two pictures; one was of the Parthenon and the other was of Mouse Island.

Finally we got to the original city of Corfu. This is a truly fascinating and beautiful place. The Old Town is on a peninsula with a large fort at either end, the Old Fort as it is known is at the point of the peninsula guarding from sea approaches, and the so called New Fort is at the other end protecting from land attacks.

While the old town is very impressive though I do have to note that all the house paint sellers must have starved to death many centuries back from lack of customers

We spent a pleasant couple of hours exploring the narrow lanes and having a leisurely lunch.

A considerable area between the Old Fort and the top of the Old Town had been cleared during the French occupation to create a large treed square and when the English took control of the island at the end of the Napoleonic wars, they built a very grand and imposing Government House there. It was so large I couldn’t get back far enough to get it all in the photo.