Six episodes of this series were written aboard motor yachts, and every single time somebody asked: so when do we see sails? In July the answer came alongside in Calvi by itself. GIGI is a 2025 Sunreef 69 — 21 metres long and, more to the point, 11.35 metres wide, because it's the beam that turns a catamaran into a floating villa. Built in Gdańsk by the yard that laminates half of football's and Formula 1's star power into their catamarans, and now in her debut charter season. Eight guests in four double cabins, a crew of four, a foredeck jacuzzi, an on-deck pool and solar panels that meant nobody had to listen to a generator at anchor. Western Corsica was the obvious match for that plan — the wildest, least built-up coastline in the Mediterranean, and the only one at this scale where the mountains walk straight into the water without negotiating. I deliberately left Bonifacio alone, having touched it during the Sardinia episode; this time I wanted everything north of it.
Day 1 — Calvi
We stepped aboard in the late afternoon in Calvi, under the Genoese citadel that has been guarding this bay for five hundred years. The crew spirited the luggage into the cabins, the captain spread the week's route across the saloon table, and we still had time for a swim off the four-kilometre beach that runs along the pine forest. The first evening looked exactly the way a first evening should: the aft deck, a glass of Aperol Spritz, and the citadel lighting up stone by stone above the harbour. The chef welcomed us the simplest and best way this island allows — fresh oysters from the Étang de Diane and a whole grilled sea bream, with a chilled Vermentino from Patrimonio. We stayed on that aft deck long after the port went quiet.
Day 2 — Scandola and Girolata
I got up at dawn — still my favourite hour on the water — made myself a coffee and took it up to the upper deck: the sea flat as a mirror, the citadel turning pink in the first light, boundless calm. After breakfast we worked south along a coast that grew redder and more vertical with every mile, until we entered the Scandola reserve — a volcanic slab of UNESCO-listed coastline where columns of red rock drop straight into deep blue water and ospreys circle above the mast. Swimming is only allowed in designated spots, and it's right that it is. For the night we picked up a mooring at Girolata — a village with no road, reachable only from the sea or on foot through the maquis. A dozen houses, two little restaurants, a mooring field. We ate spiny lobster on deck — the captain had taken the tender straight to the fisherman for it — and watched the village switch on the eight lamps it has to its name.
Day 3 — The red calanques
On day three we crossed the Gulf of Porto and came in under the Calanques de Piana — and this is the moment of the week when everyone on board simply stops talking. Rust-red, porous spires three hundred metres tall, carved by the wind into shapes in which everyone sees something different: a dog, a bishop, a heart. Tourists on the cliff road get thirty seconds of them between two hairpin bends; from the water you have them to yourself for hours. We anchored off Anse de Ficajola, a tiny cove below the vineyards where the water is a colour I can only call azure, and spent the whole afternoon doing precisely nothing: lying on the trampolines between the hulls and swimming in warm, crystal-clear water. The Seabobs never left the garage that day. That water needs no help being interesting.
Day 4 — A day under sail
On day four the thing I'd been waiting for since Calvi finally happened: the captain looked at the forecast, smiled, and shut down the engines. We hoisted the sails and for four hours ran south in a rhythm none of my previous episodes has known — eight knots, the sound of water between the hulls, and nothing else. On a motor yacht, speed is the attraction; on a catamaran under sail, the attraction is silence. We passed Cargèse with its two churches — one Greek, one Latin, the legacy of Greek refugees three centuries ago — and anchored for the night in the wide Gulf of Sagone. Jacuzzi on the foredeck in the evening, then dinner: grilled tuna, followed by Corsican brocciu cheese with fig jam that my stomach remembers to this day.
A broker's note: a catamaran in Corsica is a different charter economy from a motor yacht, and it pays to understand it before you book. First — a draught under two metres lets her into anchorages a 27-metre motor yacht cannot approach, and western Corsica is a coastline of anchorages, not marinas. Second — the 11 metres of beam that feel like luxury at anchor become a bill in a marina: most ports charge catamarans 150–200% of the standard rate, if they have space at all. A week planned "the catamaran way" — mostly at anchor and on moorings — can actually cost less in port fees than a motor yacht week, but it has to be planned by someone who knows which bays hold in a westerly. Third — Scandola has hard rules: no-anchoring zones and approach limits that change more often than the pilot books get updated. That part is exactly what I take on.
Day 5 — The Bloody Islands and Ajaccio
On day five we came down to the Îles Sanguinaires — the Bloody Islands, four dark-red porphyry islets with a lighthouse, scattered across the mouth of the Gulf of Ajaccio. The name explains itself at sunset, but we arrived in the morning, when we had them entirely to ourselves, and swam in the channel between the islets over meadows of posidonia. In the afternoon we berthed in Ajaccio and went ashore — to the market on Place Foch for cheese, charcuterie from the maquis and olive oil by the canister, and for an hour's walk through the town where Napoleon was born and which lets you forget it on precisely no street corner. In the evening the chef served what the market had provided: prawns, mussels and the rest of the day's catch, with the city playing its lights behind the stern.
A motor yacht gets you to Corsica faster. A catamaran makes you actually be there once you arrive — eight knots, silence, and a coastline in no hurry whatsoever.
— Tomasz Wrzesiński, yacht broker, Monaco
Day 6 — The Gulf of Valinco
On day six we left the city behind the stern and dropped down to the Gulf of Valinco, to the anchorage off Campomoro — a village with one beach, one Genoese tower on the headland and zero reasons to hurry anywhere. It was our quietest day: long swims in water warm as a bath, a walk up to the tower through the scented maquis, a nap on the trampoline. We had the last big dinner of the week on deck as the sun set dead ahead of the stern — lobster, Vermentino, and a toast to an island that had not looked the same twice all week.
Day 7 — Back to Ajaccio
The last day is always my favourite moment of the week, and this time was no different. Ajaccio was two easy hours away, so nobody rushed the morning — coffee on the upper deck, smooth early water, everyone noticeably quieter and noticeably browner than in Calvi. I stepped ashore already drafting the list of bays that deserve a full day next time instead of two hours. That's usually the sign the trip worked.
What it costs and what's worth knowing
GIGI — Sunreef 69, 2025, 21 metres long and 11.35 metres of beam, 8 guests in 4 cabins, crew of 4, foredeck jacuzzi, on-deck pool, solar panels, and a garage holding a Williams 505 tender, two Seabob F9s, SUPs and a full snorkelling kit — charters at €68,000 per week in High Season 2026, plus APA of around 30% — roughly €20,400 for fuel, provisioning and stops — plus port fees. Bear in mind that a catamaran under sail burns a fraction of what a comparable motor yacht does — but pays double for her beam in marinas, so the final bill depends more on the style of the route than on the rate card.
And the thing no brochure will tell you: western Corsica rewards boats that can sit close to the shore and don't need a marina every evening — which is exactly what a large catamaran is. But the same route planned without knowing Scandola's zones, Girolata's mooring field and the afternoon libeccio can turn into a week of running from the swell. Working out how to shape it for a specific group in a specific week is exactly the part I take on. You have the map; a guide is still worth having.
GIGI is based in the Western Mediterranean for the 2026 season — French Riviera, Corsica, Italian Riviera, Amalfi, Sicily and Malta all within reach. Debut season; the calendar is filling fast. See the charter listing for S/Y GIGI → or write to me directly: tomek@wyachts.com.