Sensational Sardinia

The last two days in Cagliari (Sardinia) we felt like old hands – knew where we hadn’t been and where we wanted to revisit. Our hotel smack bang in the middle of old town meant we could head off in any direction to explore.

The mornings were great walking weather and on Thursday we headed to the port and wandered around the harbour before breakfast..

Slightly overcast as the sun rose through the clouds

And burned off to a blue sky day…

The home of Luna Rossa Prada is here, the one our kiwis beat out to win the America Cup last year in Barcelona…

And where our own Peter Burling will be for the next challenge as he jumps boat to the Italian Team!

Meanwhile a cruise ship rolled in to disembark all its boat people for a day in Cagliari…

A familiar face, the old seagull, catching the morning breeze on the Seawall boulders! A welcome change from the rafts of scavenging pigeons in the town centre….

Back to the hotel for a coffee and pack the beach bag for a second day at Poetto beach…now heading for the bus with confidence! However…

The closed cafe streets all open up in the mornings for the delivery trucks and cars and it is a “humans take second place” affair! As you dive in and out of doorways to let vehicles pass!

We decided to get off the bus early and see if we liked one of the many beach clubs at the southern end of the beach! A slight mistake, as the walk from this end to where we ended up was in the blaring sunshine and considerably further than anticipated! We also needed a loo stop (of course) and the public toilet was a bowl set in the ground and smelt like the long drops on a summers day! One does what one has to do…and finding all the southern end beach clubs very crowded we continued the 3-4 km walk to the tried and true, less populated, option from the day before….the drop bag and first dip in the sea was possibly the best thing that had happened all morning!

A book read, several swims, a snack at the lido and back to the hotel (bus) for a cool shower before the evening dinner selection! Actually we did have to take a stop after the bus ride for a refreshing cocktail to round off the afternoon!

Now our last night of eating options….I had spied a cafe the previous two nights, which was always full, where its patrons were eating bowls of mussels! I had to have these before I left!

Entree size and about 30 mussels in a tomato flavoured soup! Just as good as they looked! I did share a couple with my travel buddy, but cleared the bowl and drank the soup (mostly) selfishly to myself!

Yesterday was our last day, and we weren’t flying back to Malta until the evening, so we packed and stored our bags at reception…and visited the local church that had been our window view for the last four days!

Starting our day with steps (again) we had the place to ourselves and walked around it to its piazza….where like every tag-able wall in Cagliari, this one also sported the locals artwork! Tagging is still definitely a thing here!

We had a little peek inside

Before we headed off (on foot again) in the only direction we had not explored towards what we had worked out was the modern shopping mall…and it was…there were a couple of tricky navigational challenges until we worked out how to cross the highway!

The mall was a modern affair with lots of shops with sales (or salads as they are called here) air-conditioned and nothing we felt we needed to buy!

Nearing lunchtime and a little foot (and leg) sore we thought to take a bus back…ok not so expert on the buses…we walked…dodging the plethora of dog poo that adorned these residential streets of this newer part of town! Another 40 minute walk spent looking at our feet …. for obvious reasons…we did not want to get to the airport smelling of dog poo!

With another two hours before we had to collect our bags and head to the airport, we once again investigated the eating options…not at this point realising we had saved the best for last! A beer or wine + a ciabatta roll with ham,cheese and tomato + a cappuccino for a mere €12 and as I paid the bill, the waitress gave us a shot of a local liquor to top it off!!!

Full and relaxed…we collected our bags and took the train to the airport with our two hour check in time to perfection…

Or so we thought…two hours turned into 5 as there was an airport strike in Italy, which again we only found out after clearing a manic customs! Then to top it off…another 40minutes after boarding the plane due to a technical “issue”. We finally arrived back at our Malta abode after 9pm!