1 month ago
10
January 27, 2026 — 5:00am
It’s a Friday night in May, and the sun is setting over the citadel of Ajaccio in Corsica. I’m watching the scene from the harbour with an Aperol spritz in hand, with pumping techno music blaring from the speaker behind me.
A rooftop bar? No. A super yacht? No. This party central is the Mega Victoria, a 35,000 gross tonnage Corsica Ferry destined to arrive at Toulon, a port city between Marseille and Nice on mainland France, 11 hours from now.
My husband and I, along with two friends, are on our way back home to Nice after spending four nights touring Corsica, France’s fiercely independent island outpost in the Mediterranean, by motorbike. Our bikes are parked up amid the cars packed tight like a tin of sardines on the two lowest decks, without their panniers, which we’ve brought up to our cabins on the decks above. After a quick change out of our motorbike gear and into something cooler and lighter, the four of us have reconvened at the top deck Lido Beach Bar for what the French call apero and the Italians call aperitivo — that great European sundowner tradition.
Bottles of prosecco are flowing. The vibe is more afterwork in a hip Sydney beer garden than end-of-the-week drinks on a nearly 40-year-old ferry. Until the first bars of Gala’s Freed from Desire play over the loudspeaker. With that euro-pop anthem for a soundtrack, there’s no mistaking what continent we’re on.
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Like other car ferries connecting mainland Europe with Mediterranean islands, you would never call Corsica Ferries, easily distinguished in ports by its distinctive yellow and blue livery, a cruise line.
The lowest decks on the ship double as parking lots, capable of accommodating up to 500 vehicles. The cabins are clean but shoebox-sized and have little by way of frills: only two single bunk beds, a shower over a toilet, a picture of the sea to make it feel like you have an ocean view (some actually do, but they are in high demand and book up quickly).
Even having your own room on an overnight sailing is a luxury, considering how many people save their euros by sleeping on chairs and even the floor. Then again, given that crossings rarely take any longer than 12 hours — and that could quite easily be during the day — sometimes paying extra for a cabin isn’t even necessary.
Yet as we top up our spritzes with prosecco and the ferry starts to pull out of Ajaccio harbour, I can’t help feeling that this is a version of a sail-away party. We’re excited about the night ahead at sea and that sense of freedom that comes from being on the water. It also feels like we’ve signed up for a taste-test of Mediterranean cruise life at a fraction of the price. Between us, my husband and I paid $310 for our passage, an interior cabin and a motorbike.
As passengers start to move inside for dinner, we join them. We swerve the crowds in the self-service cafe, deciding that the end of our motorbike adventure deserves white linen and an a la carte menu at the poshest venue on board, Dolce Vita restaurant. From our table next to the floor-to-ceiling windows we watch the sun set over the sea. The restaurant is busy with chatter, the crew are delightfully friendly and the fritto misto I order is surprisingly good for ferry food — even if it’s somewhat overpriced compared to what we had become accustomed to in Corsica.
Afterwards, we pop our heads into the late-night Palace Dancing Bar. More euro beats are playing in a dimly lit bar that sports a shockingly electric blue design, seemingly unchanged since the vessel was launched in 1987. We resist the urge to turn one nightcap into something we will regret when we have to drive the final stretch home on the bikes in the morning. But I’m sold on how fun this ferry has been. The only thing missing is a theatre show.
THE DETAILS
CRUISE
Daily Corsica Ferries services connect mainland Europe at Toulon and Nice in France and Savona and Livorno in Italy with Ajaccio, Bastia and L’Ile-Rousse in Corsica. See corsica-ferries.fr
FLY
Emirates flies daily to Dubai from Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, where you can connect to the daily flight to Nice. See emirates.com
The writer travelled at her own expense.
