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 They call it the "North Coast", the North of Sardinia of course.
It is an endless stretch of land and especially sea that reaches from Alghero, looking westward to the Baleari Islands, to Olbia, looking eastward to the Tyrrhenian Coast of Latium. There are about 900 kilometers of coastline: that amounts to more than a tenth of the entire perimeter of the coasts of Italy.
Alghero is also known as Barceloneta, little Barcelona. Conquered after a long siege by King Peter of Aragon (he had to come here in person to besiege the town), it was repeopled with Catalan colonists: six and a half centuries later, the memory of its founders still lives on in the language, religious folklore, songs and melancholy Gothic architecture of the old town centre. In 1541 the Emperor Charles V stopped there to hunt boar and found it "bonita y bien assentada", that is pretty and pleasantly situated: it was well protected on the seaward side with a system of towers and ramparts that still surround it. When the traveller lands at Fertilia Airport, the old plan of the fortified town strikes him immediately with a greeting (in Catalan of course: bienvinguts, welcome).
 Picture:
Escala de Cabirol -
Neptune's Cave (Alghero)
All around Alghero there are sea, beaches and vineyards: here some of the best of Sardinian wines are produced, which are famous throughout Italy. But the greatest attraction is still the sea with the series of coves where the juniper bushes grow right down to the shore: and at the end of the bay there is the gigantic calcareous rock of Capo Caccia perforated with caves where Sardinian man lived as many as eight or nine thousand years ago. Neptune's Cave, may be reached overland. going down a steep staircase of 650 steps, carved in the sheer rock face (see picture below).
 Right on the edge of the bay is the imposing nuraghe Palmavera (see picture) and, a little farther off, the grand neolithic necropolis of Anghelu Ruju.
Picture:
Nuraghe Palmavera
Moving westward, after rounding Capo Falcone, we come to the Gulf of Asinara, a broad sickle formation of earth and sand that occupies almost the whole north coast of Sardinia. Up in the north, tourism has transformed Stintino from a little fishing village into a busy summer resort: its beach of La Pelosa with its green waters looks towards the island of Asinara, soon to become a great natural park.
Porto Torres is one of the three important ports in Northern Sardinia. It was one of the first towns to be founded here abouts: when it was a Roman colony it was called Turris Libisonis, and various remains of imperial buildings can still be seen today. The Basilica of San Gavino is the finest example in Sardinia of religious architecture from around the year one thousand. The most important Roman road went from here to Cagliari; today a 226-kilometre-long highway runs right from one end of the island to the other.
 Castelsardo (see picture) is a fortified town perched on a steep promontory. It was founded in the early thirteenth century by the Doria family of Genoa who called it Castelgenovese.
Whenever it changed its masters it changed its name, so for four centuries it was known as Castellaragonese before assunting its present name two centuries ago. In the steep staircased streets of the old town centre it is not uncommon to see women and girls sitting in doorways weaving the basks for which Castelsardo has always been famous.
After Castelsardo the coast is a long crescent-shaped tongue of sand dotted with little towns and new tourist resorts: here the River Coghinas winds its lazy way down to the sea, with waters so warm that some people have suggested that Homer thought of this place as the site for Ulysse's descent into Hades. Now they feed the spa at Casteldoria.
After places with new tourist-sounding names (Costa dei Tinnari, Costa Paradiso, Portobello di Gallura) and with an old seafaring vocation (Isola Rossa, Rena Majori - that is "big sand"), the coast changes again suddenly: the golden limestone of the Bay of Alghero and the long candid beaches are followed by a phantasmagoric cascade of granite, worn by the wind and rain into the shapes of prehistoric animals or unreal creatures. It is said that at Capo Testa the great sculptor Henry Moore found a model for many of his statues.
Santa Teresa di Gallura is one of the most important seaside resorts on this coast, for it is the port of departure of the ferry boats that sail every day to Corsica, Sardinia's syster island, born from the sea millions and millions of years ago, and now separated only by about ten miles of sea in the Strait of Bonifacio (a boat trip of less than an hour). Looking rather like great snow-capped mountains, the white cliffs of Corsica form the background of one of the most thrilling seascapes in the Mediterranean.
 Here begins that great galaxy of islands, large and small, that form the Archipelago of Maddalena, a paradise for underwater fishermen, windsurfers and courageous yachtsmen.
Only the largest island is inhabited; it may be reached from Palau (another town where there has been a great development of tourism, standing close to the refined summer resort of Porto Raphael).
La Maddalena itself is worth the trip, it has a Naval Museum and glorious historic memories (the Navy, the siege laid by the young Napoleon in 1793 and the long stay of Nelson's fleet), but above all it has breathtaking views of both land and sea such as those that may be seen from the shore road that runs all around the island. A small bridge leads to Caprera with its Garibaldi Museum, "the only true place, the only sacred place of the Italian Risorgimernto".
 Here begins the best-known of Sardinia's coasts: the one which, after the bay of Arzachena (Cala Bitta, Baja Sardinia), has its busiest crossroads at Porto Cervo (see picture on the right), the "capital" of the Emerald Coast. This is a VIP paradise, with the largest marina in the Mediterranean, but it also has an unbroken sequence of little secret beaches, gentle rocks, maquis scented with myrtle, waters that really are emerald green: 55 kilometres of coast to suit even the most demanding visitor.
 Picture:
Porto Rotondo
After Golfo Aranci, a seaside resort but also another important port for connections to the Peninsula , Olbia is the real "main port" for tourism in the island: this port holds the record for passenger traffic, together with the Olbia-Emerald Coast airport where the control towers stand close to the cropped remains of a Medieval castle.
From here we can travel south on the eastern Sardinian highway (tiring but unforgettable), or reach other places on the island.
Olbia too is an old town; soma say it was founded by the Greeks, some by the Phenicians, others only by the Romans. In Greek its name means "happy": you only need to see it in summer to understand how in recent years its vocation for tourism has helped it live up to its name.
Further south the coast is sheltered by the great calcareous rampart of the island of Tavolara, rearing so strongly out of the sea , with its peak frequently topped with clouds, a scene which some say suggested to Dante his idea of "Purgatory".
But there is much more to Northern Sardinia than its splendid coastal "skin". To see a side of Sardinia no less authentic than the coast you have to go inland: there are other towns to see, an incredible number of places and monuments af archeological interest (the "Nuraghe Palace" of Torralba is so called because that castle of more than three thousand years ago, fortified with towers around the central keep, almost 20 metres tall even today, quickly conjures up the image of some shephered king who may have lived there); there are the grand Medioeval basilicas, standing alone in green spaces in the silent countryside, as though they had been drawn into the landscape with their strong contrasting layers of black and white stone (trachyte or basalt and limestone), in the style preferred by Pisan Romanesque taste.
Sassari is the capital of the Province of the same name. A town of early Medieval origin, immediately trained in the concepts of liberty of the communes, has maintaned the features of its cultural roots in the character of its inhabitants. The most important buildings is the Cathedral, with its stone façade tickly carved according to the unbridled fancy of Spanish colonial Baroque; the old town centre leads up to Piazza d'Italia, a lively piece of late nineteenth-century urban architecture.
But in Sassari there are many other places to visit and especially two large exhibition sites: the Archeological Museum, rich in memories of Nuraghe and Roman civilization, and the Handicrafts Pavilion, an extraordinary review of popular art throughout the island (do not fail to see the carpets from Nule, Sarule, Bonorva, Aggius and Ittiri, the knives and leather goods from Pattada, gold and coral from Alghero, cork from Calangius: they are all real pieces of civilization, not only fascinating souvenirs).
 Then there are smaller towns such as Tempio (surrounded by greenery at the foot of the Limbara massif), Orzieri (with its neo-classical architecture), the little towns in the Goceano district, surrounded by tick forests (at Foresto Burgos they rear the agile, regal Anglo-Arab-Sardinian horse; at San Saturnino di Benetutti, health-giving springs flow where long ago the Romans already knew the powers of these waters), and a hundred other villages where traditional peasant and pastoral culture is still very much alive, even though no one now wears the splendid costumes of long ago (to see thousand of them all together you have to go to the great "Sardinian Ride" in Sassari on the second-last Sunday in May - see picture): all have their own specific identity, a particular flavour of their own.
And while we are talking about flavour, we must not forget the cousine, rich in a thousand inventions: the cakes, roast meat, fish, lobsters and sweets, all with an unmistakable character.
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