Sardinia

Trip to Sardinia, via Camargue, Corsica, and back via Italy

Corte - Bastia

11 juin 2023

My first activity in Corte (after the siesta ^^) was to look for brake pads. My front brakes are starting to make a nasty noise. There’s no bike shop as such, but there’s a mountaineering shop that hires out e-bikes, so I ask them. The mechanic took me into her workshop and said she’d seen a box with brake pads but didn’t think it contained what I needed, v-brakes. Miraculously, the box contained one pair of v-brakes ! I quickly fitted them, as the old pair was completely worn out with the (…)

Vezzani - Corte

9 juin 2023

It’s a very short stage this morning, so I set off late, at 10am. I made a detour to the village centre, which I hadn’t seen the day before, because I had to go and look at the names on the war memorial !
This gives me a chance to see the beautiful church and the central village square, which is currently being renovated. I also had a chance to chat with some of the locals.
Then it’s off to the real start, after putting some air in the tyres. I hadn’t touched them since the start and the (…)

Solenzara - Vezzani

8 juin 2023

Departure after breakfast from the campsite café on the beach. The weather is fine. I follow the main road for a while before turning off towards the mountains.
I’m going to stop off at Vezzani to cut short the stage that would have been a bit long on Corte.
The sky is starting to look threatening... My landlady will tell me that it’s sunny every morning and starts raining every afternoon.
It’s rising slowly but steadily. Except for the impressive Inzecca gorge, where the gradients (…)

Porto Vecchio - Solenzara

7 juin 2023

A forty-kilometre ride that could have been pleasant if it had been on a road with less traffic.
Landscape : the Côte de Nacre with some very pretty beaches... disappointment at Solenzara, which is just a big tourist port that’s not very pretty, but arriving at the campsite it was very quiet, very welcoming and with "normal" prices, not a shotgun blast to the tourist’s piggy bank ^^.
The only annoying thing is the fighter planes that go by quite often.
Tomorrow the road to Corte will be (…)

Santa Teresa Gallura - Porto Vecchio

6 juin 2023

Yesterday was my last day in Sardinia. Rain was still forecast for the afternoon so I hurried off to do what I wanted to do in the morning : go to Capo Testa and take one last dip in Sardinia 🙂
Capo Testa has some pretty little beaches, an imposing lighthouse and the old one it replaced next to it... but above all the "Valley of the Moon" to the west of Capo Testa, a place where the granite modelled by the elements gives very tortured or liquid shapes depending on the place. In the 70s, (…)

Aglientu - Santa Teresa Gallura

4 juin 2023

I was going to have an extremely short stage, so no hurry, I’m leaving late. But not too late because rain is forecast. I set off in the rising fog. I passed a very small country road and was amazed at the number of cars on it. I understand why when I get stuck after an hour on the road. In fact, it’s the twentieth Sardinian car rally. I tried to negotiate my way through, but was turned down. Eventually I saw that a few kilometres further on there was a road leading off to the side that (…)

Bortigiadas - Aglientu

3 juin 2023

Short stage today... I chose Aglientu as my base because it’s a good stage from Monti... But from Bortigiadas it’s only 31.4km...
So I set off late, and follow the road slowly as I stroll along... but during my snack break I hear thunder rumbling and the sky has darkened considerably. I check the Italian weather website, and in the area I’m in (and elsewhere too ^^) thunderstorms are expected soon.
I picked up the pace and it was 5 km from Aglientu that I caught the first shower. When I (…)

Benetutti - Bortigiadas

2 juin 2023

Today’s route is a bit longer : I’m going to Bortigiadas (below Tempo Pausania) instead of Monti as originally planned. The route is labelled with the same level of difficulty but with 20km more ! It was a beautiful day with few clouds at the start. The first stop was to tighten the wedge on my right boot, which had come loose. It’s better to have a good grip on the boot when climbing to Patatada, the highest point on my route. On leaving Patatada I quickly realised that I was no longer on (…)

Orgosolo - Benetutti

1er juin 2023

There were a few problems : yesterday I had a bad case of angina... fortunately I was in Orgosolo for the day ; then I had some ambiguous messages from booking about tomorrow’s leg, and today it became clear that the booking had been cancelled. I ended up finding another solution by modifying the route quite a bit... Fortunately, as the weather was rotten, I couldn’t see myself wild camping in thunderstorms...
Orgosolo doesn’t take all day. What’s remarkable about this village are the (…)

Cerdadu - Orgosolo

30 mai 2023

Today’s route was a little tougher, as it included the 1246m pass of Correboi.
I set off at around 8.30am, determined not to waste any time, so as not to be put off by the ticking clock on this slightly tougher route. But at the first change of direction, I’d turned in the right place but hadn’t seen that I had to change direction again almost immediately afterwards. I went a kilometre too far, retraced my steps and saw that the sign at the entrance to the road indicated that it was cut (…)