As a little girl living in a small town, a family of 8 living in a 4 bedroom home, never in my wildest dreams did I believe I would be exploring a foreign country such as Corsica.
As we continue our traveling journey I feel more and more blessed that God had this plan for me. I cannot wait to see what more He has in store for my future.
Today we arrived in Ajaccio Corsica, a French island directly east of Rome Italy. It is only 114 miles long and 52 miles wide. It is the fourth largest island in the Mediterranean (after Sicily, Sardinia, and Cyprus) and has some beautiful mountains!
The population is about 350,000 people with approximately 4 million tourists. Stands to reason why tourism is their #1 source of income. Agriculture is second on the list.
A famous figure was born here. Napoleon Buonaparte, as we learned in our history books, led but was defeated by two of the armies of the 7th coalition in the battle of Waterloo. This happened in 1815.
There are no speed limits or toll roads and the climate is hot summers if about 95 degrees to mild winters as low as 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Sounds great to me!
Our tour bus was a short 30 minute ride up the mountain to the bee farm and essential oils manufacturing plant of two vats for processing. Both are family owned businesses.
We learned quite a bit and was more impressed with the essential oils. Mainly because we didn’t have any knowledge about it other than it smelled good.
Let’s start with the bees and honey. We didn’t see Winnie the Pooh or piglet around but there were a multitude of tiny bees flying about. This family owned business was very quaint and tucked away in the mountain. Lovely flowers everywhere mainly because the bees need them to produce their honey.
The honey here is produced 4 times a year with bees that work so hard they only have a lifespan of 3-5 weeks. That queen bee is a slave driver! But, she works hard at producing 3000 eggs per day. She, however will live and reign as queen for about 5 years! This particular business has around 500 queens so that equates to 500 hives. Since these type of bees were very aggressive in their working environment and protecting the eggs, we weren’t allowed to get close to the hives. It would have been nice to see what they looked like.
We were told about the types of honey that’s made and how it’s made. Spring and summer honey is sweeter and thicker. Autumn honey is smoother and richer in texture much like our honey at home. Winter honey, since there are no flowers for the bees to feed on are different.
Insects deposit sugary substances in the trees and the bees feed on this substance and then take it back to the hive and go to work. Due to the lack of flowers during winter the bees don’t work as hard so there is less honey made. This winter honey is very bitter. The taste had a licorice and almond taste. Most uses are with after-dinner coffee. Another popular use is for losing weight. They say it helps curb the sweet craving. After tasting it, I’m not sure I would replace it with my chocolates!
We bought a few jars of the good stuff that will last 35 years but probably not in our household. We loved this little home business and learned so much!
We left on foot and walked up a steep hill, a good workout for sure, to the essential oils distillery. Two brothers, Jean-Pierre and Paul own this business and do an amazing job. They almost looked like twins. Their English was a little harder to understand so we did our best to try and understand how it was made. Their knowledge of how the oils work on different ailments or just relaxation, was impeccable. Different flowers and herbs are used to process the oils. It’s all organic and grown on their farm. I walked away with 5 or 6 concentrated oils for my migraines, bronchitis, relaxation, chucks bursitis and bruising. I’ll let you know if it works. We are very curious about the bronchitis since I’ve had it twice in 3 months.
This tour was wonderful in comparison to yesterdays. We loved the education and mostly loved the beautiful scenery. Corsica is a place we would love to return.
Tomorrow we arrive in Civitavecchia Italy. It is the port town outside of Rome, which is about a 2 hour drive. We won’t make the trip today since we are visiting on the World cruise. We look forward to visiting the Colosseum, Vatican, St. Peters Basilica and more. Very excited for that trip.
This is the end of our transatlantic cruise but now we are leaving on the same ship for 6 days to Naples, Venice and a few Croatian ports so stay tuned for more adventure.
May God bless you always!
Chuck and Lea Ann
WorldTravelReynolds 