Tiscali

Last week we decided to go away for two days in a camper. For us it’s a new way to organize our hiking trips. Marta, our ten-year old daughter was with us. We rented a camper in Porto San Paolo, ten minutes from home (www.campersardegna.net). We tried a very roomy one, with six beds. Marta was very excited and she checked all the cabinets. She loved this tiny moving home very much! To reach our first camp site we travelled south. The camper was very comfortable and the countryside with its colourful blooms was so amazing, that the journey passed very quickly. We stopped once, to admire the view,  when we passed the Cedrino river.

We reached Dorgali and we decided to spend the night in the valley below the town, Oddoene.

We stopped the camper near the river Flumineddu. Before having dinner we had a walk along the river, in the decreasing light.

As the sun went down we listened to little birds preparing for the night,  with their last calls of the day. At night we were alone, the town is ten kilometers away. We became conscious of the night life surrounding us. A Scops owl called all night long, with its monotonous, repeated “tyuh”. The river was flowing and it was possible to hear, now and then, some dogs barking in the dark. We woke up early, appreciating being inside nature and being able to start walking so quickly after a good breakfast, without spending time travelling by car in the morning. We decided to go to Tiscali first. Tiscali is a nuraghic village hidden in a chasm in Monte Tiscali which had been inhabited up to the time of Roman invasion. The footpath we chose isn’t the classical one to Tiscali, but we love it very much and we frequently arrive at Tiscali starting from Oddoene, instead of starting from Lanaittu (Oliena). As we were the first to walk on the path that morning, we were able to sight a big male mouflon, a wild sheep typical of Sardinia and Corsica.

We enjoiyed the first flowering orchids, too. After two hours, we arrived at the village. This site is one of the rewarding ones in this area, but as it’s so fascinating, it’s also crowded. So we prefer to arrive in the early morning and we usually avoid visiting at the weekend during the high season. Last week we were alone with the guide of Cooperativa Ghivine. Before guiding us through the village, he prepared a coffee that we tasted in the silence. It was really astonishing to see the remains of the buildings once more, thinking of the villagers and their lives centuries ago hidden in the heart of the mountain.

Time flew quickly on the way back and at noon we were back. We spent the afternoon lazily resting on the bank of the river planning where to go next time with the camper.