A Can of Sardines
 

Words: Dave Mitchell
Photos: Ditte van der Meulen & Dave Mitchell

Part One

Once upon a time, in early September we set sail for Sardinia inside Moby Magic. A bloated ferry with an insatiable appetite for trucks, motorhomes and cars. It floated calmly overnight from the Italian port city of Livorno. Hardly a wave was felt while we soundly slept, arriving refreshed to disembark at the top of the island. Our first impressions were how big and beautiful the city of Orbia was. We marvelled at the two lane motorway that according to local legend travels the length and breath of the island, a military road no less. Unfortunately the roadside is the preferred place to dump household rubbish, as opposed to the excellent recycling service the local authority has provided.

The Egyptians and Greeks had good things to say about Sardinia, its climate, food and people. The Romans considered it a malaria infested dump ruled by barbarians but still their influence remains to this day. It may have just been a grudge as they could never impose total control or much influence over the Islanders. The Island sits slap bang in the Mediterranean about 200 kms off to the left side of the Italian leg. It is roughly 200 km long and 100 km wide and about the same size as Imperial Wales, in old money. It's pretty hot and dry but not in a Spanish sort of way and lucky for us the temperature starts to drop when you head into the mountains or at the end of a long hot day.

The Stats

Just over three million visitors come to Sardinia each year and most head straight for the beaches. A Mediterranean climate, crystal clear water and sandy beaches, with lots of sun makes this so. Which leaves the left fielders to visit a few of the amazing archaeological sites and beautiful limestone caves. Trampers and bikers are left to enjoy the uncluttered high country and wilderness. The coast gets about 400mm of rain per year, inland 700mm and the mountains 1000mm which also frequently get snow in winter. Most of the local brew 'Ichnusa' comes in half or one litre bottles. This helps the islanders double the mainland's consumption. I must confess the non filtrada (unfiltered version) is rather refreshing.

By their own admission the Sarda are a stubborn and independent lot reluctant to accept outside authority. They kept the invading hordes at bay over the centuries. Even amongst themselves they agree to strongly disagree. They live in one of the fabled 'Blue Zones' of the world where centenarians are over represented and home-grown olive oil is drunk for breakfast. Ingeniously stacked circular stone towers called 'Nuraghi' were built by the islands early inhabitants and date back over 3500 years. Some 7000 examples have been found and 10,000 are thought to exist. They functioned as watch towers, communication stations and village sanctuaries at times of conflict or invasion. Cool in summer and warm in winter, just like a thermos.

For riding purposes our guide book 'Mountain Bike in Sardinia' published by Versante Sud had divided the island up into five regions: SOUTH-WEST, SOUTH-EAST, CENTRE-EAST, CENTRE and NORTH. This made it easy for us to base ourselves close to the best riding areas. So from Olbia we descended the island to Tortoli following bright white limestone along the coast. The town of Italso would be our base in the Centre-East region for a dozen days of riding and exploring.

Ride 72 Sinisola - Montalbo
Limestone Blocks

Our first ride climbed from the spaghetti-western town of Sinisola. We parked in a shady spot on its edge and rode narrow cobbled streets as the temperature climbed towards a promising 31C while colourful washing hung from third story balconies to dry in no time flat. We pedalled a sealed road into the countryside with wild figs, olive and pear trees growing beside the carriage way. A steep metalled road took us through a pine plantation and into a limestone landscape where roadside springs provided cool water to the weary traveller. Amazingly these limestone mountains stretch for over 100 km in an east-west direction, rising and falling to the tune of tectonics.

A forest of ancient giant Holm oaks gave us shade as we reached the high point of the ride at 875m. Above us bright white cliffs and slabs of broken limestone created a surreal backdrop to our single trail traverse. Much of the island lay out before us, its limestone peaks, cliffs and valleys, farm, towns and villages running higgledy-piggledy out to the Mediterranean coast.

We literally rolled down our descent on a white ball bearing rock surface, but then a serpentine leaf litter trail took over, followed by a profusion of side tracks. This had us scratching our forelocks and zoom scaling our Garmin GPS. The local bikers had been busy on the lower slopes, installing jumps and berms they could shuttle up to. We finally rolled back into town and headed straight for our first Sardinian gelato. "Start as you mean to continue" I say.

Ride 52 Freeride Santa Maria 292
Loose Morales

From our base camp between the seaside towns of Arbatax and Tortoli, our next two rides rated high on the technical scale with some sections full of super loose rocks and tight switchbacks. A rather dodgy combination on a good day.

A steep gravel road headed uphill around the slopes of Monte Scoine and delivered us to Locorbu. This sits just below Monte Oro where stunning views unfold across the super deep blue Med. Sandy beaches ribbon the coastline with rows of deck chairs, sun umbrellas, boats and BBQs – like soldiers on parade. A tempting destination as seen from the international space station. After lunch we bounced down techie singletrack back to Santa Maria, rolling through short scrub and over boulders pretending to be rocks with relaxing dirt intervals in-between. It was a sore arms and tired legs end to the day, with a spin on the blacktop back to base.

Ride 51 Talana Olinie Sorberine 286

A tough initial climb on dirt was made way harder by the many washed out sections the weather had gifted. Scenic views and the promise of an endless 10 km 1000m singletrack descent containing 70 switchbacks made it all worth while. We did encounter some long rock slab sections and a dodgy staircase to heaven. It was mighty difficult to stay afloat on, but we managed to survive a long day out full of scenic splendour, rocky tors, deep ravines and some great riding.

A more relaxing ride was on the cards with a short loop up to an awesome limestone plateau. Amazing scenery followed us the whole day and sweet singletrack took us back down to Gairo where we relaxed in the sun.

Ride 38 Ulassai 224

This undulating, predominantly forestry road figure 8 resides in the centre-east of the country. It starts and finishes in the beautiful historic town of Ulassai, surrounded by rock faces and mountains, a climbers paradise. We pedalled past Grotta Su Marmuri which is considered one of Europe's important cave systems for its length and height. On a subsequent visit we marvelled at its stalagmites and stalactites, its secrets explained to our tour party only in Italian.

Our ride delivered us to two major historic nuraghi. The first Nuraghe Urceni, a substantial multi-tiered structure that looked almost complete. We could roam at will and climbed a staircase inside its circular stone tower to the top. Above the tree tops a 360 degree view was our reward. Further down the track Nuraghe Serbissi appeared and was of an even more ambitious piece of construction. We lunched there before circling back below Punta Su Scrau on tarseal, dirt and finally leaf litter singletrack to Sa Canna, with a final climb and fast descent that took us back to town.

Ride 47 Punta La Marmora Da Flumini 269

This outstanding centre-east ride would take us to the very top of Sardinia’s highest peak, Punta La Marmora standing tall at 1834 meters. From Flumini we headed up a sealed road hoping to escape the rapidly rising temperature. A dirt road greeted us half way up and beside it, at over 1200m, resides Sardinia’s highest Nuraghe at Arruinas. The dirt track continued up to Luisu Cucca where singletrack heads to the top. A large flock of sheep guarded by two huge white fluffy sheepdogs stopped us in our tracks before they moved on to greener pastures. The final climb was rather rocky but the huge stainless steel cross perched on top of the peak gave us something to aim for.

After seeing not a soul all day we were greeted at the top by a few groups of walkers having come up from the opposite side. We lunched below the top in a sheltered spot before advancing onto the famous Serra Enna Elua singletrack DH. The surface was rocky, lined by rocks, surrounded by rock tors, rock outcrops and random piles of rocks. Spectacular and menacing at the same time. We encountered two more large flocks of sheep and their guard dogs but not another human in sight. The lower section below Monte Terrarba became smooth and fast with a final section of mule track back to Flumini. We came across one of the many historic round stone shepherds' huts that are still used to this day. This had a cone shaped roof and would not look out of place in a fairy tale.

Ride 58 Urzulei Gasu 326

From Lampattu a steep climb on an unmade track greeted our knobbly tyres. It climbed up to Monte Pisaneddu perched at 1236m where stunning views surrounded us. It then plummeted on singletrack and dirt to Fennau where a short climb took us to Tombe dei Giganti di S'Arena. This ancient rock tomb resides on a small plateau surrounded by forest and scrub. No skeletons presented themselves. An awesome singletrack DH took us to Campos Bargious through an extremely scenic and beautiful stretch of countryside. We encountered a mixture of sheep, goats, pigs, donkeys and horses all grazing side by side like liquorice all-sorts. A final undulating dirt track took us back to Lampattu where we made friends with two donkeys, as we packed the bikes back into the van.

Ride 45 Marutorco 256

A double trouble figure eight was navigated successfully traversing a selection of fire roads and dirt tracks in the Riu Mamutorco mountain area. We started and ended on seal with the climb heading up to a modest 670m.

Stay watching for the next gripping episode of Escape from Sardinia - 'Sardines on Toast'.