Issy hasn't slept well. She says she was kept awake by the noise of the lift doors. The lift doors are certainly very annoying. They're right outside our room and they've been opening and closing all night every night we've been here, even when there's seemingly no one around to press any of the buttons. We've been trying to get around this by sending the lift back to the ground floor every night just before we go to sleep. This works for a while until someone else on our floor comes back to their room, and it seems that a resident of our floor is always the last guest back to the hotel every night. Issy says that if the next hotel has bad wifi, no bar fridge, and a noisy lift, she'll be divorcing me. ... read more

We walk down to the dock to buy tickets for an afternoon boat cruise to the Scandola Nature Reserve south of Calvi. Issy's very keen to get an outside seat on the boat in the fresh air away from the diesel fumes. Issy and boats have often not been a good mix, and white paper bags have sometimes been required. We decide that we must get back to the dock early so that we can be at the front of the queue and be sure of getting a seat in the fresh air. We wander around Calvi looking for somewhere to get a light lunch. We've noticed that restaurants here don't seem to be big on light lunches; most of them only seem to offer the same full blown meals at lunch as they do at ... read more

We set off towards Calvi and pass a cross on a cliff overlooking the sea near the hotel. It seems that this is a memorial to 400 Corsicans who died offshore from here when their boat was torpedoed on 16th August 1918. Coincidentally it's 16th August today and someone has left a candle next to the memorial. We walk down to the waterfront and then up into the Citadel. We read that the walls and towers were built during the 16th century, when Corsica was part of the Genoese Empire, to protect it against attacks by pirates from North Africa. We go into two large rooms built into the rock which house a military display. We read that this is the headquarters of one of the regiments of the French Foreign Legion. We then realise that ... read more

We sleep in and have a domestic morning washing clothes and paying bills. We discover that our flight to Corsica leaves quite early tomorrow morning, and that we'll need to order a taxi for 5am. We try to book a taxi on line. The first site we try won't recognise our address, and the second one says that all the available taxis are fully booked at 5am tomorrow morning. I think what this really means is that most taxi drivers in Madrid will be in bed asleep at 5am tomorrow morning. The third site says that we need to download an app to use it, but we can't get the app to download. Thankfully the fourth site seems to work. I hope that the taxi turns up. It would be a long swim to Corsica. We ... read more

We have some time to kill before our guided tour of the Prado Museum this afternoon. Issy says that she wants to visit the Botanical Gardens, which are very close to the Prado, so we wander slowly through the streets in that general direction. A man approaches Issy and insists that she takes a small sheet of paper that he offers her. Issy says that we should always take things that people offer us, otherwise they'll think that we're rude. She tries to read what's on the piece of paper, but it's all in Spanish. I tell her that I think it's offering her the services of a man from Africa to help her with her love troubles. I wonder why the man was so insistent that she take it. I hope he doesn't know something ... read more