BONIFACIO (Bonifaziu) enjoys a superbly isolated situation at Corsica's southernmost point, a narrow peninsula of dazzling white limestone creating a town site unlike any other. The much-photographed haute ville , a maze of narrow streets flanked by tall Genoese tenements, rises seamlessly out of sheer cliffs that have been hollowed and striated by the wind and waves, while on the landward side the deep cjustify between the peninsula and the mainland forms a perfect natural harbour. A haven for boats for centuries, this inlet is nowadays a chic marina that attracts yachts from all around the Med. Separated from the rest of the island by a swathe of dense maquis , Bonifacio has maintained a certain temperamental detachment from the rest of Corsica, and is distinctly more Italian than French in atmosphere. The town retains Renaissance features found only here, and its inhabitants have their own dialect based on Ligurian, a legacy of the days when this was practically an independent Genoese colony.
Such a place has its inevitable drawbacks: exorbitant prices, overwhelming crowds in August and a commercial cynicism that's atypical of Corsica as a whole. However, the old town forms one of the most arresting spectacles in the Mediterranean, easily transcending all the tourist frippery that surrounds it, and warrants at least a day-trip. If you plan to come in peak season, try to get here early in the day before the bus parties arrive at around 10am
The Town
Apart from the cafés, hotels and restaurants of quai Comparetti, the only attraction in the ville basse is the marina's aquarium (May-Oct daily 10am-8pm, July & Aug open until midnight; €3.34), where a solitary blue lobster is the star attraction. At the far end lies the port where ferries leave for Sardinia and, in between, a cluster of restaurants and shops lies at the foot of montée Rastello, the steps up to the haute ville . In the haute ville many of the houses are bordered by enormous battlements which, like the houses themselves, have been rebuilt many times - the most significant modifications were made by the French during their brief period of occupation following the 1554 siege, after they had reduced the town walls to rubble.
From the top of the montée Rastello steps you can cross avenue Général-de-Gaulle to montée St-Roch , which gives a stunning view of the white limestone cliffs and the huge lump of fallen rock-face called the Grain de Sable . At the Chapelle St-Roch , built on the spot where the last plague victim died in 1528, more steps lead down to the tiny beach of Sutta Rocca .
At the top of the montée St-Roch steps stands the drawbridge of the great Porte des Gênes , once the only entrance to the haute ville . Through the gate, in place d'Armes, you can see the Bastion de l'Étendard (April, May & Sept Mon-Sat 11am-5.20pm; July & Aug 10am-9pm; €1.52), sole remnant of the fortifications destroyed during the siege of 1554. A few paces further lies rue des deux Empereurs , where no. 4 features the flamboyant marble escutcheon of the Cattacciolo family, one of many such adornments on the houses of this quarter. Opposite stands the house in which Napoléon resided for three months in 1793.
Cutting across to rue Palais-du-Garde brings you to the church of Ste-Marie-Majeure , originally Romanesque but restored in the eighteenth century, though the richly sculpted belfry dates from the fourteenth century. The facade is hidden by a loggia where the Genoese municipal officers used to dispense justice in the days of the republic. This church's treasure, a relic of the True Cross, was saved from a shipwreck in the Straits of Bonifacio; for centuries after, the citizens would take the relic to the edge of the cliff and pray for calm seas whenever storms raged. The relic is kept in the sacristy, along with an ivory cask containing relics of St Boniface, and you'll only be able to get a glimpse if you can find someone to open the room for you.
Nearby rue du Palais de Garde is one of the handsomest streets in Bonifacio, with its closed arcades and double-arched windows separated by curiously stunted columns. The oldest houses along here did not originally have doors; the inhabitants used to climb up a ladder which they would pull up behind them to prevent a surprise attack, while the ground floor was used as a stable and grain store.
South of here, rue Doria leads towards the Bosco ; at the end of this road a justify down rue des Pachas will bring you to the Torrione , a 35-metre-high lookout post built in 1195 on the site of Count Bonifacio's castle. Descending the cliff from here, the Escalier du Roi d'Aragon 's 187 steps (June-Sept daily 11am-5.30pm; €1.52) were said to have been built in one night by the Aragonese in an attempt to gain the town in 1420, but in fact they had already been in existence for some time and were used by the people to fetch water from a well.
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