SANTA TERESA TO ORISTANO

22-24 September 2022

This holiday had begun as a roadtrip intended to circumnavigate Corsica, but quickly expanded to include Sardinia when we realised that the two islands are joined by a 50 minute ferry between Bonifacio and Santa Teresa.

Our enthusiasm was channeled into mapping a route that would allow us to see most of the two destinations in a reasonable amount of time, resulting in a fast-paced action-packed 2 week itinerary crafted on a one-day-on-one-day-off driving strategy. Day 1 in Sardinia would thus be covering the long snaking 300km-odd backward S, which would take around 3 hours with 110kmph max speed limit.

Never did we consider that our single-minded roadtrip was actually across two countries and it was only when we collected the car in Bastia that it dawned on us that we were contracted in France… and on reading the documents not endorsed to take the car to Italy and, more importantly, not insured if we left the country. 

We had wrestled with the decision on whether to take our chances or, if not, what to do with the car we had. Our itinerary was to travel the length of Sardinia on our first day, thinking we’d get the big drive (3 hours from the ferry port in the north to the capital, Cagliari, in the south) behind us and enjoy the return journey at a more leisurely pace. This meant very real risk upfront in unknown territory.

It was only on the morning we were due to leave Corsica that the decision made itself. The risk was too high to abscond to Italy with the French car. We would leave it in our hotel parking in Bonifacio and get another rental in Sardinia. We jumped online and booked a car in the ferry port town on the other side, Santa Teresa.

Confident we had made the right choice, we slipped back into our gameplan; fresh pastries and crusty footlong sandwiches from the artisanal bakery next to our hotel.

With a backpack full of baked goodies, we walked to the ferry at the end of the promenade, checked in, boarded and were off to Sardinia to start our Italian episode.

When the ferry arrived in Santa Teresa we were able to use the offline Google Maps we’d saved in advance of the trip to direct us to the car rental agent, only a few hundred metres away in the tiny town.

The wind was taken out of our sails when we presented a South African drivers licence and were told that Italian law required an International Drivers Permit and he was expecting a hard copy original with some sort of official stamp. An absolutely outdated bureaucratic convention! But a showstopper nonetheless. 

The chap at the store was sort of helpful, Googling the phone number for the South African Consulate in Rome in case we wished to seek their help (!) and letting me use his phone to go online to clarify the rules and seek alternatives. 

We tried the two other rental agents in the vicinity; one held the same opinion about the IDP and the other wasn’t concerned, but didn’t have a car available until the next day.

We weighed up our options. Spend the night in Santa Teresa to get the car the next day? Or catch a bus to the nearest big town, Olbia, where there would be more options? 

We chose the latter and found out that there was a bus to Olbia Airport leaving from the Santa Teresa bus terminus at 2, which was an hour’s wait… but not terrible with a beer garden adjacent where we bought refreshments and sponged some poor soul’s internet (who has an open network from their phone?!) to keep ourselves entertained – and procure an online IDP to have a first line of approach should we be asked to present something at the next place.

The bus ride wasn’t terrible. Very comfortable coach and a bargain at €4 for the hour and a half ride. We even contemplated staying on the coach all the way to Cagliari and just using busses for the remainder of the Sardinian chapter… until the man sitting in the seat in front of ours got up, swaggered to the front, garbled something at the driver, swivelled towards the door and then proceeded to violently projectile vomit what looked suspiciously like Alfredo sauce (from the unsettlingly distinct ham and mushroom pieces) into the lap of the lady sitting in the front row!

There was much excitement as the bus was stopped, Alfredo was ejected and the poor lady mopped down with wet wipes and tissues from pitying passengers.

Fortunately there was not much left of our journey because the waft of Alfredo’s recent ex-lunch wasn’t great.

Olbia Airport had a generous selection of car hire options. The first, Sixt, had no qualms about renting us one – no IDP required – and we were soon zooting off in a spanky black Mini Cooper.

We plugged our destination into the Mini’s dashboard nav and let the lady lead us out of Olbia and onto the open road. She took us over a windy-windy mountainous route, which was slower going than the National roads but very pretty scenery that was not that different to parts of home, truth be told. The golden plains punctuated with dark green bushes and trees and backdropped with blue grey mountains could probably be mistaken for the likes of a Van Reenen’s Pass back home. It is remarkable though that there is so much of Sardinia still uninhabited and undeveloped considering its size.

Thankfully the Mini was a pleasurable drive because at times the twists and turns, blind corners and narrow roads felt like a video game. Would have been a nightmare for poor Alfredo.

We arrived into a bustling Cagliari evening. The roads were very busy and it was tricky to navigate according to the GPS lady’s instructions when she very clearly didn’t have a handle on the congestion or the impatient drivers hooting as they manically changed lanes.

Fortunately our hotel was only one road in from the main marine parade, so easier than it could have been if we were deeply bedded in the city. 

We found a parking quite close to the hotel which seemed too good to be true… and it was. On checking in our concierge told us that the parkings in the Marine district require a permit so we’d have to move. I agreed to finalise the check in and move to the room while Chris moved the car.

Almost an hour later Chris arrived back at the hotel, after an unsuccessful mission and with the car back in the same too-good-to-be-true parking bay.

We returned to the concierge to seek advice on options and he produced a magnetic parking card for the pay parking bays a mere 200m from the hotel, available at €8 a day fee. Why had he not offered this to us before?!

We parked the car and walked into the Marina district to get some dinner. I had spent my waiting time doing some Google research on where to go, so at least we had a single-minded purpose. And a reservation waiting.

We were warmly greeted on arrival at White Rock and, having done my online research of the menu, it was an easy ordering process. 

The food was delicious and we enjoyed our pasta and steak dinner, washed down with local Ichnusa beer and entertained by Attila, a teacup dog in a teeny-tiny puffer jacket who kept trying to escape his parents to join our table. 

FRIDAY

Vowing to leave the car in place all day, we planned our schedule to allow a generous allocation of time to the hotel buffet breakfast (included in our room rate) before dashing off to meet for the walking tour we’d booked for 10am.

Our guide, Julia, was ready and waiting and we were soon off to hear all about Cagliari as we walked through the 4 districts that the tour covered.

We started at the Saint Rémy Bastion; an impressive facade that we couldn’t help but notice on our arrival. Although in 1700s neo-classical styling, the bastion had been nearly destroyed in World War II so the current structure we were seeing was a rebuild that was intended to match the original as closely as possible. (Along with much of the city which was heavily bombed as as part of the Allies’ strategy against Mussolini).

We were given free time to wander the large open terrace, admiring the panoramic view of Cagliari and the natural beauty of its surroundings, before moving to the next district, Castello, entering through Lions Gate.

We walked through the narrow streets (for ventilation and protection, according to Julia) listening to anecdotes about Sardinian history and culture. Being in the middle of the Mediterranean, it had been valuable to the stronger nations, resulting in defeat and rule by the Pisans (wanting to make Cagliari a mini Pisa), Spaniards for 300 years until the Italians took over in the 1700s. 

The story is summed up in their national flag which has a white background, a Red Cross (like a + sign) and the silhouette of 4 Moors facing west (Spain). This is to represent how St George helped the King of Aragon to defeat his 4 Moorish enemies, each wearing an earring to symbolise them as savages and with their eyes closed to symbolise how they were blind to Christianity.  In more modern times the flag has been updated slightly, with the heads facing east (Italy), the eyes opened and the earring removed as a sort of acknowledgment that they may be seen as racist in the new world.

The woke world we live in is a far cry from the brutal history Cagliari has seen. The Elephant Tower with its 13th century inscription at the gate, still bearing the coats of arms of the families that united to create the fortress to protect their families. The lengths they had to go to! Layers of hand-smithed metal gates on primitive but effective pullies to keep invaders out. With a wooden interior scaffolding on the interior of the gates so that if they did succumb to their enemies, it would be easy to quickly burn to the ground.

Later, during the Spanish rule, the wooden interior of the gate was enclosed to make a prison. It was renowned for being one of the most brutal and intended for the cries and howls of its prisoners to warn the citizens what would become of them if they didn’t play by the rules. 

The Castello also had a curfew. It was only inhabited by Spanish soldiers; the Sardinians who worked in the bastion had to be out by the time the gates were closed at 8pm. Those who missed the curfew were unceremoniously thrown over the high boundary wall, to fall to their death below.

Once the tour was over, we walked to some of the further sites not included in the group route to visit the likes of the archeological museum and the Roman amphitheatre which is still in remarkable condition seeing as it’s more than 2000 years old!

Done with the culture part of the day, we planned to pass a relaxing afternoon at the beach. We had asked Julia for a recommendation on which beach to visit since Sardinia is known equally for the quantity and quality of its beaches.

She shared that while most of the beaches are breathtaking, Cagliari is windy so it’s best to choose according to where the wind conditions are most favourable. Fortunately there is an app for that, so she logged into her MayBay app and checked a few places – they even have a web cam so you’re not just relying on stats – and suggested Poetto, which we could access on foot, by car or on a selection of busses.

We walked the 5 or so kilometres to the beach seeing as we were in no hurry and all the sights were new to us anyway. 

The beach was gorgeous! Blue blue sea, golden sand and only a hint of a breeze which was welcome in the brilliant sunshine. We thoroughly enjoyed a couple of hours of swimming and sitting. 

Doing nothing can be thirsty work though, so we hoofed back to the hotel to get cleaned up for a sundowner and some dinner. 

We marked off the Guinness Index (R107.95 each) at an Irish Pub called Old Square and then had dinner in one of the very many restaurants in Medina, sharing a pizza – we’d been hankering after all day – and a stuffed pasta local favourite that Julia had recommended that we try.

SATURDAY 

Based on Julia’s advice, we made a slight detour on our plan for the day – a 107km drive north to Oristano on the west coast – to latch on a visit to Pula and Nora due 37km further south. 

The significance was twofold: an archeological site with ancient city remains and the destination for an annual pilgrimage in May in honour of St Efisius who was martyred in Roman times and still emotes devotees to walk from Cagliari to the church in Nora where he is laid to rest. So devout are his followers that the pilgrimage even happened through World War II when Sardinia was being bombed!

We checked out of our hotel, Chris liberated the car and used some very poetic licence to drive up to the door of the hotel to collect me and our heavy suitcase and then we were off!

We followed the blue blue ocean along the coast and, despite a few red herrings from our onboard GPS, had little trouble finding our way.

Nora was founded by the Phoenicians in around the 8th century BC on the Capo du Pula. The shelter of the cape allowed safe sea landing no matter which winds were blowing. Based on the gustiness of our ‘not windy’ visit, this must have been a make or break back then.

The Romans arrived around the 2nd Century BC and built their settlement on the foundations of the Phoenician settlement. It was only around the 2nd Century AD that the Romans invested more heavily in the area, building the big fancy houses they are famous for as well as a temple, forum etc. 

The Vandals made their way to Nora in the 5th Century AD and ransacked the city, which prompted the inhabitants to disperse into smaller agrarian groups. By the 8th century AD, further continual raiding by the Saracen pirates made the area completely impractical and it was abandoned once the few remaining inhabitants moved inland for their own safety.

Not much of the Phoenician town still exists, but the Roman remains built over the original town offer an interesting wander through time, with quite a lot of buildings still distinct and tangible finishes like floor tiles still clearly visible and in remarkable condition, bearing in mind how long they’ve been there and exposed to the elements.

Easy to see why early settlers chose the place – beside the access, the shelter of the cove etc etc, the beach is beautiful. Even old St Efisius didn’t do too badly to have this as his final resting place (although, arguably, not being martyred in the first place would have been a bigger win).

Back in the car, we abandoned Mini’s phantom roads and followed the signs to Oristano. 

We arrived to a dead. Quiet. Town. 

Not. A. Soul. About.

Even the Spar was closed. Looked like their siesta was from 2-5.

We checked in at our hotel, prepared to lay low for a bit until things woke up. We checked the Tourist Office hours and coincided our re-emergence with their opening.

Oristano is small and we were staying centrally so it was only a few blocks to the Office and we soon had a simple walking tour map in hand and a worthwhile mission to keep us entertained. It was easy to get epic photos of everything with so few people about!

One of the sights is The Tower; clearly one of the ancient city wall entrances. Besides finding signs of life at the cafe on its piazza, there were sound rigging people setting up some pretty impressive gear. Looked like Oristano was preparing to party!

We did some people watching and pre-sundowners for a bit before the munchies set in. Googling didn’t help the situation, revealing that almost everything only opened around 8. It wasn’t even 6 yet! How do these people survive waiting that long for dinner? Especially since everything had been closed all afternoon.  When was lunch?!

We circled the route we’d been on earlier, rationalising that the busier touristy roads were more likely to wake up first. It was slim pickings but we were drawn in by a cocktail-bar-cafe called Lola Mundo, playing The Cure and advertising sandwiches.

Happy for the snack to keep us going, we ordered. My toasted cheese, ham and mushroom was delicious… but a mere morsel as one slice of bread folded in half and served as a single toasted triangle. Clearly Sardinia is not for the South African appetite! (Although, granted, the people of Sardinia are generally petitely proportioned).

While enjoying the playlist, piazza and free wifi, some research of the area produced result of an Irish bar a mere 120m from us. It seemed rude not to poke a nose in!

Old Town Birreria sure had committed to Guinness. Not only was there painted signage on the outside of the building and the usual assortment of beer mats, coasters and other branded goodies on the bar itself, Old Town had literal Guinness murals on the walls! Although we’d marked Sardinia on the Guinness Index already, this kind of commitment had to be rewarded.

Our good karma was rewarded with a large tower of complimentary French fries served with our pints, as a sort of Tapas.

Wandering back to The Tower we discovered that the riggers had been setting up a free open air concert, by the looks of things hosted by local radio station Sintony.

There was a chap with a mixing desk and three others playing violins and a cello at the top of the tower, with digital screens at the bottom, around which a generous crowd had gathered to enjoy the show.

Young and old were having a merry old time in the vibrant piazza. How fortunate we were to have been in the right place at the right time!