Sardinia A Journey By Car

By Enrico Massetti

Would you like to see all of Sardinia in just one week’s car journey? This guide will help you go around the entire island, with clear color maps that indicate the distance and time between places, in addition to photos of the localities. It gives you the route to follow between the different stages.
Do you have more days available for your Sardinian vacation? Of course, you can spend them at your favorite beach, the guide describes the most beautiful and significant ones all over the coast, and gives you indications on how to reach them from the stopovers.
Do you want to expand your knowledge of Sardinia beyond just the beaches? Alternative days are suggested for tours with old restored narrow-gauge train lines that allow you to relax for one day without driving while you are immersed in the natural uncontaminated environment of Sardinia's interior.
Also, experiences with mountain guides that can show you the mountains of Sardinia, and their beauty are listed as possible activities for alternative days.
You should not miss boat tours of the La Maddalena Archipelago, or guided boat days in the beaches of Eastern Sardinia, or visits to natural caves, they are listed at the right place when your path crosses these possibilities.
Barbagia is covered: you should spend a few days visiting these remote localities that until not too long ago were just considered a place where the “bandits” were living.
Each location that the route passes through, has also a list of meaningful local tourist destinations and attractions you can explore and visit on your own.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Enrico Massetti
• Release date: Oct 8, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463020425

Enrico Massetti

Enrico Massetti nació en Milán, Italia, donde vivió durante más de 30 años, visitando innumerables destinos turísticos, desde las montañas de los Alpes hasta el mar de Sicilia. Ahora vive en Washington, Estados Unidos. Sin embargo, visita regularmente su ciudad natal y disfruta recorriendo todos los lugares de su país, especialmente aquellos a los que puede llegar en transporte público. Puede contactar con Enrico en [e-mail].

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Enrico Massetti

Sardinia a Journey by Car

Enrico Massetti

Text Copyright © Enrico Massetti 2015-2021

Images ©, or CC Creative Commons license, as specified for each image

Cover image © Enrico Massetti, Adobe inc.

Published by Enrico Massetti

All Rights Reserved

2021 edition

ISBN: 978-1-6780-1346-2

remembering my first visit to these villages

many years ago, they are still the same

Acknowledgments

This book results from my collaboration with many editors, readers, buyers, and photographers who put their work in creative commons license or licensed it at reasonable terms.

Without their contribution, I could not have done it correctly.

Restaurants reviews

All the restaurants mentioned in this guide have perfect, tasty food and attentive staff. Therefore, I will only outline what is unique for each of them.

Links to the establishments’ websites

Many establishments invested quite a lot of money to have their website. Unfortunately, many of them do not have the security of the Secure Layer SSL installed. As a result, accessing the website can expose you, the visitor, to all kinds of risks, including malicious stealing of financial information, like your credit card number or the installation of viruses on your computer.

I did not include any links to these websites, only those with SSL protection. You can recognize if the security is present or not from the character on the left of the website URL in your browser’s top line. I urge you not to use websites that are not secure.

Since most establishments also have a presence on Facebook, a secure environment, I linked to their Facebook page.

Nature, Art, and beaches in Sardinia

This guide illustrates a one-week car tour of Sardinia. It initiates in Olbia and ends in the same city, but you can start and finish from any other town in the itinerary.

If you have more days available for your vacation, you can spend them on the beach of your choice; you have only the embarrassment of deciding which one it is.

A boat trip around the Island is also a good alternative.

Should you instead not be a beach and sea type, many alternatives allow you to leave the car parked and experience a different Sardinia aspect.

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The first is to ride one of the five Trenino Verde, a narrow-gauge railroad recently refurbished old running stock at a leisurely pace through a tremendous green environment. It will allow you to enjoy the scenery peacefully, without worrying about driving.

At Treninoverde.com/trenino-verde-point, find all the references on who books and sells tickets.

The other is to stop driving and experience the adventures I propose; I referenced these alternatives these nature guides provide.

The brief comments under What to do or see are tourist spots you should not miss while in the area.

Sardinia is an island in every sense of the word. Its culture is of natural origin. It lies a long way from the mainland, and it still astonishes the visitor with the sharp, natural contrasts between its bare, rocky coasts, its gentle rolling inland plateau, and the variety of cultures found there.

The prehistoric period is more a living fact and has more evidence above ground than in most places, mingling with modern life in a sometimes-fascinating way.

The most notable feature of this is the building fever, which has taken the Islanders since Sardinia was opened to tourists and attacked a society still, for the most part, patriarchal.

The original inhabitants had a lively and unique taste in a building, the famous nuraghi, and were no mean sculptors, as seen from the local bronzes.

The Greek world hardly touched Sardinia, and in the great carve-up of the Mediterranean in classical times, it fell under the domination of the Phoenicians and the Carthaginians.

Rome then assimilated and left its mark, more notable here than in many Italian mainland parts. It was fought for by Genoa and Pisa during the Middle Ages while developing free forms of government, such as the giudicato, unusual among medieval political institutions.

Map of the trip

The Aragonese held it until the 18th century, when it became part of the Kingdom of Sardinia’s territory, from which the modern state of Italy grew.

Sardinia Beaches

The beaches in Sardinia are immaculate. Whether in one of the secluded bays or on one of the busier town beaches, you will always find an excellent standard of cleanliness - both regarding the beach itself and the water quality.

Water sports are available on most coasts during summer, including water skiing and windsurfing. Porto Pollo, near Palau in the north, is a favorite spot for surfers and kitesurfing. Sailing is another favorite pursuit, particularly around Alghero, the Costa del Sud, the Costa Smeralda, and the Maddalena archipelago. However, most will have to make do with joining a group with an entire crew.

Sardinia is also one of the Mediterranean's best locations for diving, and there are local outfits offering tuition and excursions with complete equipment provided.

The best beaches near the localities described in this itinerary are here. In addition, you can interrupt the driving for a break on a secluded beach.

Olbia

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Golfo di Marinella - Olbia - hibiscus81/shutterstock.com CC BY-NC-SA

OLBIA, a pretty seaport town with one of the most beautiful Romanesque churches on the islands, San Simplicio (11th century), is elegant and intact in its simple lines, which stand isolated.

But our attention is mainly drawn by the astonishing richness of the natural beauty afforded by the views of the jagged coastline, which consists of three bays as we go north from Olbia, the Golfo degli Aranci (Oranges), Marinella, and Arzachena. 

The Emerald Coast, whose recent tourist development is Sardinia's most definite holiday attraction today, is the central stretch of this beautiful landscape of rocks, caves, and beaches.

The road from Arzachena to Palau is a succession of breathtaking views. It gives an unmistakable impression of humankind’s prehistory as it runs among enormous granite boulders among rocky hills and valleys.

What to do or see in Olbia

Corso Umberto I is Main Street with dining, hotels, shopping, and more.

Visit San Simplicio-Historic Basilica with frescos.

Golfo di Marinella.

Porto Istana Beach.

Tomba Dei Giganti - Giants' tomb is the name local people and archaeologists gave to a Sardinian megalithic gallery grave built during the Bronze Age by the Nuragic civilization.

Spiaggia Pittulongu.

Giants' grave of Su Mont’e s'Abe - The Giants' grave of Su Mont'e s'Abe is an archaeological site in Olbia.

Castello di Pedres.

Insula Felix -