Cagliari, Sardinia

Yes, sardines are named after Sardinia. Well, probably. 

Our revised itinerary has taken us to the city of Cagliari on the island of Sardinia. I knew little about this island. It did get bombed by the British in WWII in an attempt to confuse the Italians and Germans as to where the next invasion would occur after the invasion of Sicily.

Viking did an admirable job of setting up a tour of Sardinia’s capital city, finding buses and guides for the passengers. Given the number of buses, perhaps 3/4s of the nearly 1000 of us opted for a hastily arranged excursion. Complicating the effort, I am sure, is that there was another cruise ship in town, a similarly sized one, the Silversea Muse. This is the first cruise ship other than our own we have encountered on this trip.

Our guide, a German-Sardinian (more German than Italian by accent) admitted she reluctantly accepted this assignment as she had just returned from Germany the previous day. She did a good job nevertheless although occasionally giving confusing rendezvous instructions.

The history of Sardinian is similar to that of Corsica until 1600 or so. The island avoided invasion by the Arabs but was even more subject to slaving raids by the Moors. A key difference with Corsica is that Sardinia was part of the Aragonese, then Spanish Empires for 400 years (with interludes of ownership by Savoy, Austria, the Pope, and others). The native Latin-based Sardinian language is described as a blend of Spanish and Italian. It was not until 1861 that Sardinian officially became part of Italy

With the collapse of the Roman Empire, Sardinians moved inland to the hills to avoid the Moor pirates and slavers. That is where the Castello or old town district of Cagliari is located.

Let’s move on to the photos of our tour.

Left: Our first photo stop was to view a church that I could never get identified. We did not go inside. I thought, oh no, this hastily organized tour is not going to be very in depth. I was wrong. The rest of the tour was excellent. Right: We view Cagliari from the heights of the hills outside the city.

Left: We passed these whimsical carvings in the rocks. Look closely. There are three creatures. Right: A less whimsical sculpture.

Most of our tour was in the Castello, the fortified old city.

The old palace and a newer apartment.

Our guide stated that the Castello is no longer a desirable place to live. She said it was too dark, that there was too much bureaucracy to get the approvals for upgrades and renovation, and there were ownership issues that are taking decades to resolve. As an example of the approval process, she said it took eight years to get her garage roof replaced.

Left: The province’s government headquarters. Right: The old town hall.

Left: The bishop’s residence, conveniently located between the political headquarters and the cathedral. Right: The Cagliari cathedral or Cattedrale di Santa Maria Assunta e Santa Cecilia.

The baroque interior of the cathedral.

Some of the dwellings in the Castello are in good shape and others not. 

Looking down into the lower town.

Left: Elephants in Sardinia? Probably not. Center: Many of the old town streets are still of cobblestone. Right: The Sardinian flag. Corsica has only one severed head of a Moor on its flag. The Sardinian flag has four. The natives really, really, really did hate and fear the Moors.

We walked down to the lower town, as busy as any modern Italian city. After some free time there, the buses return us to our ship.

As much as we regret missing a visit to Algiers, we quite enjoyed Cagliari. Tourism has come late to this island. Sardinia is experiencing a severe population decrease, caused by a low birth rate, emigration of young adults, and a lack of immigration. (This is one of the few Western European locales without much immigration from Africa and Muslim countries.) With the growth of tourism here, maybe that’s its future.

Another Day at Sea

We had another evening in the specialty restaurant of Manfredi’s. It was a great meal and even the house wine served was quite good. Overall, we’ve been very pleased with the food offerings on board this ship.

I don’t really understand the decisions the ship’s captain has made regarding our itinerary changes. The weather charts indeed show erratic conditions but seem out of synch with our at sea and port times. After a beautiful day in Cagliari, this day is at sea. The conditions are rough, although not nearly as bad (thus far) as the day we bypassed Marseilles. (The wind induced white caps are quite beautiful.) The distances between Sardinia to Mallorca then to Cadiz are about the same as between Sardinia to Algiers to Cadiz. Mallorca and Algiers are not far apart. Perhaps it was just too difficult to set up visas and tours a different day than originally planned when trying to visit Algeria.

Nevertheless, it’s off to Mallorca! And despite my gripes, we are quite enjoying this cruise.