Sardinia to Discover

This year my boyfriend and I, particularly stressed after 11 months of routine, had decided on a quiet holiday, preferably somewhere lovely, which never hurts...

And so on 30 July at 9 pm we set sail from the port of Civitavecchia for Sardinia. The crossing is fairly long, the ferry is the slow one... but our holiday is waiting for us... Goethe said that "the anticipation of pleasure is itself a pleasure"... so... At 6 am the next day we can already glimpse the Sardinian coastline... but another wonderful spectacle unfolds before our eyes: two dolphins swimming at the bow of our boat and heading off towards the horizon... a beautiful experience... the holiday is off to a great start!!!!

After a good three hours of driving... the car crammed with stuff, up and down the bends of the old s.s. 125 that winds along the sea for the whole eastern side of the island... we reach Cala Gonone. The little town is beautiful, at the foot of imposing mountains and facing the sea and the whole Gulf of Orosei... it isn't very big but it's well organised and the essential services are all there. It isn't glitzy, but even so in the evening there are plenty of little restaurants and beer bars right along the seafront, so the main street fills up with sun-roasted holidaymakers after days at the beach, strolling in search of some cool air and/or souvenirs.

BEACHES: The Gulf of Orosei is made up of many coves, most of which can't be reached by ordinary transport or on foot, but only by sea. Don't worry if you don't have a boat... because at the port several licensed companies run excursions along the 40 km of coastline, which can be either "mini-cruise" style trips (visiting several coves and caves in a day) or to one specific beach. Personally we opted for the "mini-cruise": the start wasn't exactly calm, in fact we ended up (for lack of space on the boat) in a super-crowded 8-metre dinghy! We didn't even know where to put our backpacks! But the discomfort really didn't last long, because the fun and the splendid scenery took over.

Among everything, let's mention the azure and the shades of blue of the "Venus pools", the visual impact of the stunning "Cala Mariolu", the small but very welcoming "Cala Biriola", the evocative caves of "Cala Luna" and the famous "Cala Goloritzè" (so beautiful that UNESCO declared it a World Heritage Site, and so it can only be reached by swimming).

Of the beaches reachable "by land", we visited "Cala Osalla" and "Cala Cartoe", a few kilometres from Cala Gonone... the road up to them climbs into the mountains... and from up there, besides meeting the local "native" goats, you enjoy a wonderful panorama of the whole Gulf of Orosei... as for the beaches... they're sandy and the sea shelves very gently... perhaps the only beaches of this kind in the area!

CULTURE: The area where we stayed, like the rest of Sardinia, is very rich in archaeological finds from the Nuragic period. Those we visited are: Nuraghe Mannu: a well-preserved nuraghe, perhaps used as a place of worship (and even today many visitors come to meditate there). Its particular feature is that it sits right above the sea, and from there the view over the Gulf of Orosei is splendid! Giant's Tomb or Thomes: a genuine tomb called "of the giants" because of the huge quantity of skeletal remains found there when it was discovered. Also from the Nuragic period, its peculiar feature is the entrance: a huge boulder with an opening at the bottom, representing the link between the world of the living and the world of the dead.

Serra Orrios Village: a real village of Nuragic peoples, with more than 70 huts, two temples for worship and even a huge "square" for the cultural and commercial events of the time... truly astonishing!

FOOD: Needless to say, Sardinia is rich in wonderful flavours... from the refinement of fish dishes on the coast to the taste of simple, genuine dishes in the mountain refuges. Seadas, culurgiones, typical Sardinian bread, malloreddos, not to mention the cheeses... in short, we ate a lot and well, but you know the sea gives you an appetite!

In conclusion, a truly lovely holiday, all about sea and sun but also visits inland... a complete holiday, which let us discover a Sardinia a little truer than the glitz of the Costa Smeralda. See you soon.