Seven days from Corsica to Sardinia: the citadel of Bonifacio, the Lavezzi islands, La Maddalena and the Costa Smeralda.
The crossing from France to Italy on this route takes about an hour.
The Strait of Bonifacio is that narrow. Corsica and Sardinia are close enough to see across, and you can have breakfast in one country and lunch in the other. It's a route where you change country mid-week, and the two sides feel different: Corsica pulled toward France despite its Italian roots, Sardinia with an identity that predates Rome.
The week is 105 nautical miles from Porto Vecchio to Olbia, 11.75 hours under way. It's a one-way route, so you fly into one country and out of the other.
Before we dive in, it's worth noting the route below is also available as an interactive map on our Corsica & Sardinia charter page.
The route
Porto Vecchio → Bonifacio → Lavezzi Islands → Santa Teresa Gallura → La Maddalena → Porto Cervo → Tavolara → Olbia.
Seven days, 105 nautical miles, 11.75 hours under way. One-way, Porto Vecchio to Olbia.
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A complete day-by-day route from Porto Vecchio to Olbia via Bonifacio, the Lavezzi, La Maddalena and the Costa Smeralda, with anchorages, timings and the stops we'd plan ourselves. Enter your email and we'll send the full PDF to your inbox.
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Day 1: Bonifacio
Noon embarkation in Porto Vecchio, under the Genoese towers.
Île Piana is an hour out: granite, a turquoise cove, lunch while the crew has it to themselves.
Then south along the coast to Bonifacio, which is a medieval citadel on a cliff dropping ninety metres to the sea. The entrance channel cuts narrow between rock faces and even modern yachts go in slowly, under walls rising overhead. The King of Aragon's staircase is 187 steps cut into the limestone during a siege in 1420.
Dinner at Finestra by Italo Bassi.
Passage: 3 hours, 25 nm. Mooring: Port de Bonifacio or Île Piana anchorage. Beach: Plage du Petit Sperone. Dining: Finestra by Italo Bassi.
Day 2: Lavezzi Islands
Forty-five minutes southeast into the strait.
The Lavezzi are granite islets straddling the France-Italy line, France's southernmost territory, a nature reserve since the 1980s. You anchor in Cala Lazarina, surrounded by boulders worn smooth, with the water going pale jade to sapphire.
There's a trail to the cemetery island where seven hundred victims of the Sémillante are buried. The frigate wrecked there in 1855.
No development on any of it. Lunch at La Ferme on Île de Cavallo.
Passage: 0.75 hours, 6 nm. Mooring: Cala Lazarina, Cala Chiesa or the protected bays through the archipelago. Beach: Cala Lazarina. Dining: La Ferme, Île de Cavallo.
Day 3: Santa Teresa Gallura
An hour, and you're in Italy.
Santa Teresa Gallura is Sardinia's northernmost point, founded in 1808 when Carlo Emanuele IV recognised the position and named it for his wife. It's newer than the Corsican villages and it looks it: white and pastel on a grid, not ancient stone.
Rena Bianca is east of the harbour, powder sand and water shallow enough to wade fifty metres. The Tower of Longonsardo above the harbour is a 16th-century Spanish watchtower from when Barbary corsairs raided this coast. It now hosts summer concerts.
Dinner at Millo Ristorante.
Passage: 1 hour, 8 nm. Mooring: Porto di Santa Teresa or Rena Bianca anchorage. Beach: Rena Bianca. Dining: Millo Ristorante.
Day 4: La Maddalena
Ninety minutes east through the archipelago: sixty-two islands and islets, channels between granite that rises straight out of thirty metres of water.
The archipelago was a restricted military zone until 2008, and that presence is what kept development off it.
Isola Razzoli passes to starboard, a nature reserve where seabirds nest in numbers. Budelli's Spiaggia Rosa is pink from crushed coral and shell, and landing was banned after tourists carried the sand away. You look at it from the water.
Garibaldi came to Caprera for his final exile and bought half the island. His house is a museum: simple rooms where the man who unified Italy grew olives and wrote his memoirs.
Lunch and dinner on board.
Passage: 1.5 hours, 13 nm. Mooring: Porto di La Maddalena, Cala Gavetta or Cala Coticcio. Beach: Cala Coticcio, with Spiaggia Rosa viewed from the water. Dining: on board.
Day 5: Porto Cervo, Costa Smeralda
Two hours south to the Emerald Coast.
Costa Smeralda exists because in 1962 the Aga Khan IV sheltered from a storm on this coast, saw what it was, bought large parts of it and set the rules. Porto Cervo is the middle of it: a harbour cut from rock, berths for yachts longer than most villages' main streets, and shops at prices to match.
The Aga Khan's aesthetic mandate is why it isn't garish. Buildings follow Sardinian vernacular, white plaster and stone and terracotta, with the luxury behind it, not on show.
The Piazzetta comes alive in the evening. Cala di Volpe is the bay with the hotel that started the whole thing.
Dinner at Phi Beach.
Browse the fleet
Crewed yachts for every kind of week on the water, from catamarans and sailing yachts to full-size superyachts.
Passage: 2 hours, 20 nm. Mooring: Marina di Porto Cervo, Yacht Club Costa Smeralda or Cala di Volpe. Beach: Cala di Volpe. Dining: Phi Beach.
Day 6: Tavolara
Two and a half hours southeast, and out of the planned world.
Tavolara is limestone, five kilometres long and barely one wide, rising to 565 metres at Punta Cannone with cliffs on every side except a narrow western spit where boats anchor. It looks constructed, not natural.
In 1836 Carlo Alberto is said to have recognised Giuseppe Bertoleoni's sovereignty over it, which makes Tavolara the world's smallest kingdom. His descendants still make the claim and there are photographs in the family restaurant.
It's been a marine protected area since 1997, and the fish populations show it.
Cala Brandinchi is on the mainland opposite: turquoise over white sand, shallow a long way out, pine behind the beach.
Passage: 2.5 hours, 25 nm. Mooring: Porto San Paolo, Tavolara (Spiaggia Istmo del Passetto) or Cala Brandinchi. Beach: Cala Brandinchi. Dining: Gusto by Sadler.
Day 7: Olbia
An hour west across the gulf, which has been a useful harbour since the Phoenicians set up trading posts here nine centuries before Christ. The Romans called it Olbia, Greek for prosperous.
San Simplicio basilica has stood since the 11th century.
Dinner at Il Fuoco Sacro if the flight is late.
Passage: 1 hour, 8 nm. Mooring: Marina di Olbia or Olbia airport marina. Dining: Il Fuoco Sacro.
Who this suits
Groups who want contrast. The week goes medieval citadel, granite wilderness, Italian beach town, military-preserved archipelago, billionaire resort, uninhabited limestone kingdom. Nothing follows from what came before.
105 miles over seven days is light, and the longest leg is three hours on day one.
The one-way structure is the thing to plan around. You fly into Corsica and out of Sardinia, or vice versa, and the boat doesn't come back. That's a logistics conversation before it's a routing one.
Practical notes
One-way, Porto Vecchio to Olbia. Two airports, two countries, and a repositioning question for the boat, which affects pricing.
The Strait of Bonifacio funnels wind and it has a reputation for it. Conditions for your dates are a conversation with your broker.
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