A description dating from the 19th century, allotted to Ardouin-Aumazet, said this: “No area of the world gives a more powerful impression of richness. The valley is an orchard of olive-trees, fig trees, orange trees…”. So today Balagne, is not any more the “garden of Corsica” as at the time génoise, it has three assets, Calvi, theRusset-red one, and the road of Artisants which will make you discover in the back-country, an anthology of small more beautiful villages all the ones than the others. Balagne is the champion as regards animation, it always occurs something there. It there with step a summer without its festival, its fair, its concert or its exposure.

      On a side, one finds the littoral on 40 kilometers, with navy which is the pearls of a collar of incomparable ranges. Other, animated by the town of Calvi in the shade of its citadel génoise, which bathes in the legend of Christophe Colomb, which one says that it was its birthplace, and of theRusset-red one, another harbour city, that Pascal Paoli precisely founded to give him counterpart, too judging it génoise. In this decoration nest, of the village-cribs like Sant' Antonino or Pigna which knew ressusciter the artisanal activities. The balagne is rich religious buildings, churches, convents, vaults of brotherhoods and oratories. While refreshing you of water fraiche fountains, in the shade of an olive-tree or a mulberry tree-plane tree, you will appreciate the peace of these villages, where the traditions remained intact after decades of invasions.

      D' Aregno and its polychrome church pisane, in Corbara the white one, old capital of Balagne and its convent of the XV ème century; While passing by Speloncato, Santa Réparata di Balagna, Monticello, Calenzana, Muro, Montemaggiore, Cateri, etc, etc… you will be subjugés by the beauty of these places, attaching and alive. With each turning, the landscapes offer an imposing panorama to you. The many torrents which descend heights to reach the sea, create water basins calm and clear, which invite to the bathe.

      With two steps of the sea, Balagne mountainous, superb amphitheatre of coloured and staged solid masses, proposes stroll of any splendour under the Laricio pines, the oaks or the olive-trees sometimes centenaries. Walks marked out and realizable thanks to the discrete action of Balanins which propose rehabilitated lodgings, and maintained paths.

      Discovering Giunssani, for one Calvi time, it is necessary to be committed after the village of Lumio, in north on D 71, in direction of Speloncato; or to venture, on the basis of the splendid range of Lozari, beyond theRusset-red one. Then one approaches a haven of peace, protected by the small villages from Pioggiola, Mausoleo, Olmi-Capella and Valica. Girdled by four majestic solid masses, whose peaks culminate between 1700 and 2400 meters of altitude, Giussani is greener and more picturesque than the littoral balanin. Between Valica and Olmi-capella, vis-a-vis imposing MontePadro, a path marked out out of orange by the regional natural reserve will enable you to go up time: Leave the church baroque going back to 1835 to reach the four dolmens of Olmi-capella. Before discovering these monuments megalithic, the circuit proposed goes down to the river close to a mill, then goes up on 300 meters of uneven through the forest of Tartagine. To make the loop since Olmi-Capella, take D 763 until the great turning, then the marked out path engages under the holm oaks. The desire could take to you to explore the valley of Tartagine seen of Giussani. An immense network of paths marked out there at summer set up. It is really there that the in love ones with nature must go, since these places are still little known hikers and a fortiori plagists.

      The valley of Ostriconi, one of most pleasant of the island of the rising to laying down sun, is dazzling as soon as one leaves the trunk road. A path enclosed between two old walls connects Urtaca and LAMA, jewels of the valley. Many terraces recall that Balagne was the orchard of the island, and certain residences of LAMA evoke the richness of antan. From this restored village, the path is prolonged to astonishing white cliffs of Pietralba. To complete this turn in the back country calvais, go up the valley of Fango, in the south of Calvi, meadows of Galéria. It is a long excursion since the tower square which dominates the mouth of Fango, to the old village of Manso, even the forest of Bonifato. It will bring a beautiful final key to the puzzle of the landscapes of Balagne, although it remains you to discover without the corner of many paths which start from Galéria towards the limpid reserve of Scandola. Along Fango, the gilded stone sand, then green constant of the oaks, and at the bottom, imperturbable, the whiteness of the mountains of Niolo