Climbing Trip in Sardinia, the Climbers Paradise
This year, unfortunately, due to an injury, I can only dream of the classic end-of-season holidays or, as in this case, relive by arranging photos and memories …
So in this forced immobility of recent months (due to a fractured pelvis) I placed a few photos (actually a lot) of one of the most beautiful trips ever! A climbing trip in Sardinia on the road as I like it. Without commitments, without reservations, without programming, as it comes, with the person I love and a few friends met here and there on the island … A dream!
And it is precisely the non-programming that brought us to Sardinia. I would say a journey started by mistake …
Exactly one year ago (November 2, 2020) I left with Sara and my uncle’s mythical camper (Thanks Uncle !!!) for Southern Italy … The plan was to gradually descend Italy climbing here and there until reaching Palinuro passing for Gaeta, Rome, Naples, Marche, Tuscany etc … with the spirit of: “where we would have liked we would have stopped for the time necessary!”
So after 4 days from the start and a quick touch and run at Pietra di Bismantova to make two pitches with our friend Zob (Giovanni Danieli), we find ourselves in Tuscany, in Camaiore under a universal flood …
The first and only day in Tuscany was terrible …
We wake up in an incessant rain that seems to break through the roof of the camper … So we decide to give up climbing but to go and explore the village a bit and go and look for a good pastry shop to sweeten the day … No pastry … camper and as we enter we get the news that in 2 days the regions would have become “colored” and that there would be the risk of a new lockdown …
4 days of vacation and already time to go home !? In lockdown !?
Not a good start to a holiday …
We were very disconsolate and in the same situation we were also two friends, Gio (Giovanni Zaccaria) and Alice, also just arrived in Tuscany with the idea of climbing for a few days and then continuing towards Finale Ligure
They reach us with their car used as home and we have lunch together in our camper reading and rereading the dpcm to try to interpret it … Until Gio comes up with: “well let’s go to the region that is less likely to become orange or red until someone does not send us back home … because you can always return home … ”
This was the sentence that turned our vacation around … it was now 5 pm on November 5th, we started the motorhome engine and went to Livorno, we got on the ferry and at 7 am on November 6th we were in the paradise of Sardinia … Let’s start and think!
First stop Capo Testa: the Valley of the Moon
The Valley of the Moon is an incredible place, more to see than to climb, it is absolutely worth a visit! It deserves to get lost among the thousands of fantastic granite formations, deserves a chat with the famous hippies who have lived here for many years and absolutely deserves to climb the Greek route on Torraccia (Turri) … 120 meters (5 pitches) of photonic plates where the hands are not needed and the granite crystals enter the rubber of the shoes. Wonderful route with difficulty up to 6b and bolted well… beautiful!
We then climbed the crag of Cala Spinosa… at sunset it is really beautiful!
Second stage San Pataleo
After the Valle della Luna we started moving south and stopped a short distance away in San Pataleo to discover its towers
San Pantaleo is a fraction of Olbia set between wind-sculpted granite spiers, such as the Balbacana and Punta Cugnana
And it is precisely on Punta Cugnana that there is the famous “Conca Manna” or erroneously called the mouth of the shark. A granite grotto in the shape of a whale’s mouth that is actually one of the largest tafoni in Europe and believe me it is absolutely worth a visit
to get there, take an easy, adventurous and beautiful route (450m max V) called “the shark’s mouth” opened by Franco Ceppi, Mariangela Fontana, Ivo Mozzanica in 1978
below some photos and sketches of the route
Cala Gonone
in San Pataleo it would deserve to stay a little longer to discover its granite towers but the desire for the sea was greater and so we continued the journey south and stopped in Cala Gonone climbing and bathing respectively in Cala Fuili, in Cala Luna and the Millennium Grotto
All unique and wonderful places but which unfortunately share the bad state of the bolts. Be very careful which pitches to do because the salt is constantly working and the older routes have very, or rather too, rusty bolts. Especially in Cala Luna in the cave sector
Millennium are bolting it right now as I write this and it is the most incredible place to climb. It looks a lot like the Big Cave in Kalymnos and is absolutely worth a day!
Baunei
the journey south continues and Baunei is a more than obligatory stop for every climber who goes to Sardinia
The whole area of Baunei (which goes from Santa Maria Navarrese to Cala Sinine, passing through the pretoni di Oronnoro, Punta Giradili and the more famous Aguglia di Goloritzé) is the most beautiful area in Sardinia, it deserves to stay there for years and years between cliffs and slopes on perfect limestone
The Baunei area is a PARADISE and one of the most beautiful areas in Italy. I have been coming here every year for 6 years now to walk the wonderful Selvaggio Blu trek but to climb it was the first time and I must say that it did not disappoint the expectations in the least, quite the contrary!
We spent a total of 15 days here, between cliffs (the guide is in the village) and routes
three of the many most beautiful were:
– Sole Enchanter on the Aguglia di Cala Goloritzé: a truly wonderful route despite being very greasy due to the numerous repetitions
– Forest sailor on Pedra Longa,
– Light Without Memory always on Pedra Longa. Luce Senza Memoria is not a real route but a traverse 250 meters long, at a height from the water varying from 2 to 10 meters, with difficulty up to V + which with a little attention (you can’t always fall) can tackle (as we did) deep water style
– Mediterranean on Punta Giradili: the route I liked the most during the whole trip, wonderful!
I’ll leave you with some photos of these super routes … don’t you get water just looking at them !?
Ulassai
It would deserve to stay in Baunei forever but the desire to change cliffs and squeeze notches properly takes over and we therefore decide to move to Ulassai
Ulassai and Jerzu have the most beautiful cliffs in all of Sardinia in my opinion with perfect walls, reeds, overhangs and “so on and so forth” … Winter Palace and Ulassai Canyon are perhaps the most beautiful but there there is so much variety of crags that it is worth trying them all.
You remember at the beginning of the article I said: “where we would have liked we would have stopped for as long as necessary” here … even here as Baunei deserves to stay there indefinitely … we stayed there for 10 days and they literally flew …
West Coast: Piscinas, Capo Pecora, Punta Pilocca, Masua, Domusnovas
It couldn’t be good weather forever and the hurricane seemed to arrive in Ulassai for a few days with cold and lots of rain … So it didn’t seem like it was for the west coast and so under a universal downpour we decided it was time to leave Ulassai.
The first stage is dedicated to relaxation and the scent of cold that came with the disturbance made us want to ski … (after all it was December now …). Let’s try to get rid of the desire by “skiing” in the dunes of Piscinas, the largest sand dunes in Europe … beautiful!
Not far from Piscinas is Capo Pecora … the paradise of climbing trad. An incredible place with granite towers rising from the sea that make it one of the most incredible climbing playgrounds I’ve ever been to… Like a kid in a pastry shop…
Very good Sara who makes her first trad route first !!!
There are pitches for all tastes and if you come to climb Capo Pecora in Sardinia it is definitely a must! Go there! You will not regret it!
After the wonders of Capo Pecora we went to Punta Pilocca, a historic crag from the 1980s that was very famous in those years and frequented by Manolo, which had fallen somewhat in decline but was recently rediscovered with the re-bolting by the usual legendary Oviglia. Old-fashioned super-technical vertical slab pitches that will test you… a day here deserves
The skin was beginning to be desired … we had been climbing continuously for a month but the desire to discover new places led us first to Masua and then to Domusnovas before returning to the East.
Masua with its Sugar Loaf that comes out of the water as if by magic is definitely worth a visit, but from a climbing point of view it did not impress me.
I liked Domusnovas the most, a place full of cliffs with all kinds of pitches
Quirra and Jurassic Park
the weather continues to falter and the temperatures drop so the plan to go back to squeezing notches and closing the accounts with the projects left pending in Ulassai vanishes forever and we therefore decide to spend the last week of the trip in Quirra, the most arid and hot of Sardinia (this is how the guide defines it). And in fact, despite the snow had arrived in Ulassai and by now it was December 15th in Quirra it was like God …
The crag is very different from all the crags seen so far in Sardinia, violent and overhanging power but I liked it! it climbs when it is drizzling and is therefore absolutely winter in the sun
December 18th: it was time to go home … the desire to ski was beginning to take over and so we head the camper towards Olbia in the direction of the ferry but first one last stop … Jurassic Park
Jurassic Park is a mixed trad crag south of Tertenia famous for its granite cracks and for the famous Dillosaurus, a red granite finger, beautiful and subtle to take your breath away … another playground that is absolutely worth visiting (see photo below)
And below are the latest photos of this fantastic Sardinian trip (a bit of Quirra and a bit of the Dillosaurus in Jurassic Park) … A dream!
Note:
We wandered around with the camper in total autonomy for 2 reasons: we were out of season and the campsites, hotels, restaurants were closed for dpcm … that said eye where do you sleep if you decide to be gypsies like us because in “normal situations” free camping on the island is not popular
Thanks to my love Sara and to Gio, Ali, Bubba, Saia, Stefano, Andre and all the people I met on this trip for making it so amazing and unforgettable!!