"We choose to go the moon, and do these things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard"
- John F. Kennedy
The French département of Corsica floats in the Mediterranean, an overnight ferry from Nice, but just a stone's throw north of its Italian neighbour Sardinia. With its own language, and unmistakable flag, It maintains a culture that makes it very distinct from its motherland, enough that separatist terrorism has been a shadow on Corsican life for many years (some of the first freedom fighters were the parents of a certain Napolean Bonaparte, born in Corsica the year that the proto-Italian Republic of Genoa decided they didn't want it any more and turned it over to the French). I first visited Corsica in 2006, and was smitten by its granite mountains looking out to sea over scrubby maquis. Idly reading the literature, sat on a balcony looking out over the sparkling ocean, I found out that there was a walk...
(I also saw a small stray dog with the largest penis I've ever seen on a canine, but that's another story)
The GR20 (French for "GR20") is labelled as "Europe's Toughest Trek". The Grand-Randonée snakes its way over the granite Corsican mountains for 112 miles and 13,000 metres of ascent, taking its willing victims from Calenzana in the north east to Conca in the south west, over the course of 16 stages connecting mountain refuges. Most of the time is spent above 2000m, which makes the trail impassable to anyone but hardened mountaineers for 8 months of the year. In early June you should expect to still find snow in your way, and by the end of September you'll probably be needing your woolies once again. In the summer months though, the trail teems with walkers from all corners of the world, keen to take on one of the world's great hiking challenges.
Most walkers complete the walk in around 2 weeks, if they complete it at all, which is actually a rarer occurrence than those giving up sore and exhausted after just a handful of days on the trail. The very first stage requires you to ascend nearly a mile in altitude, usually in searing Mediterranean summer heat, before afternoon thunderstorms drench you and crisp mountain nights freeze you. Experienced walkers can double up on stages to get it done in 10 days or so. In 2019, François D'Haene polished off his cornflakes in Calenzana on Friday and popped up in Conca in time for Football Focus the next day. You can't blame him for not stopping. The refuges have a reputation as cramped, noisy, smelly, bed-bug-ridden hell holes, enough that most walkers prefer to sleep on the hard, rocky ground outside with a thin sliver of tent material between them and the roaming wild boars.
The Jairvan is a route, but definitely not a path. For the most part, the trail is a never ending scramble over rocks, hauling up narrow gullies, and across scree fields, following red and white markers daubed on boulders. This is a walk for which upper body strength is a distinct advantage, and where the descents are considered the tough parts. The two ends of stage 3, the refuge at Carozzu and the Ascu Stagnu ski station, are a mere 6km apart, which would be an hour's stroll around the park at home, but is an energy-sapping, knee-breaking 6 hour slog on the GR20. For the most part, you are miles from civilization, food or drink, devoid of shade or shelter, and unlikely to find any ground that would satisfy a spirit level.
It is not without its share of very real danger. The Cirque de la Solitude was considered the highlight of the jairvan, requiring "walkers" to lower themselves on chains and ladders down a steep cliff face into a chasm, traverse a boulder field, and then drag themselves back up a similarly precipitous wall on the other side. In 2015, a mountain storm washed tons of mud and rock into the Cirque, sweeping 7 hikers to their deaths. The Cirque was closed, the fixtures removed and the GR20 rerouted. Even without the obvious threat of falling off a mountain, all it takes is a momentary lapse of concentration to take a misstep and do yourself a mischief that would need an ambulance, if there was any hope of getting one within a few miles of you. If you're lucky, they'll get a helicopter close enough that you'll only be writhing in pain for an hour or two before a paramedic can hike to you.
Around the halfway point, the sleepy hamlet of Vizzavona is the most bustling metropolis that walkers will encounter in the whole 2 weeks. With a tiny railway station served by ancient rattling trains that connect the east and west coasts of Corsica, it makes a handy stopping point for those who only have the time or the legs for half the journey, like me. Flights are booked for September, and with only 2 weeks until the return flight, fitting the whole trek in would be extremely ambitious for a novice hiker, allowing time for transfers and contingency for bad weather. So it's just the northern half for me, which is half of the total distance but probably 75% of the total effort, and let's face it that's probably enough.
I don't quite know what siren call I'm answering with this, perhaps it's a mid-life crisis. For starters, I keep forgetting that 2 weeks after I return from this Quite Difficult Thing I'm still supposed to be running the London Marathon, assuming it happens. By the end of it all I'll either be very fit or very broken, or maybe just lying on the sofa wondering where it all went wrong.
