Sailing to Sardinia

by Chantal & David · Published September 6, 2023 · Updated January 3, 2024

We left beautiful Palermo and our happy memories there at 10.30 on the 9th August, heading to the most northern west tip of Sicily, our launching point for Sardinia, Capo di San Vito where we dropped our pick and waited for the right weather window. We had wanted to visit the national park islands of the Western Coast of Sicily known as the Aegladi Islands but given we had really good winds to make the crossing in 2 days time and the the beauty of the islands is said to be the tranquility, but not in August, we decided they could wait until next year!

Capo di San Vito is a beautiful bay with amazing turquoise waters and beautiful hills, sadly 2 weeks before they were seriously on fire which of course didn’t effect the beach or the waters but we were, except immediately behind the village, surrounded by something more akin to a lunar landscape, quite how they saved the village we don’t know!

Capo di San Vito Anchorage

On the 11th, we set sail for Sardinia, leaving at 7:20 am on a wonderful broad reach in a NE3-4, then the wind came round to beam, we sailed through the day and into the night in absolute bliss, the only noise being our autohelm and the wind in the sails. Unfortunately as the sun disappeared, and with it our solar power, so did our battery power, far more rapidly than should have been for a brand new set of batteries. Despite being able to sail through the night we found ourselves having to pop the engine on, not for propulsion, but for power…. the cause, well that is for another blog!

After our shifts through the night, the sun came up, and by 10 in the morning we caught our first site of the south east tip of Sardinia, still quite some miles off, but reassuring nonetheless that our night navigation skills hadn’t gone to pot during our time in Greece!

Just after 3 in the afternoon and a 159NM’s later, we finally dropped our pick in the beautiful bay of Villasimius, Sardinia, where we then spent the rest of the day and the following one, catching up on sleep and chilling out. We didn’t go ashore, having been there before albeit quite a few years ago now.

Villasimius Anchorage

On the 14th August, we set sail again, having decided to brave the West Coast of Sardinia, new territory for us as we have only been up the East Coast before. The West Coast is said to be rather windy at times, if the weather was blowing strong North Westerlies down from the Rhone, but the next few days seemed calm enough, we just hoped it would stay that way for a week or so.

Again, we skipped Cagliari, the capital, as we have been therefore, and if anyone wants to know about that beautiful city, have a look at our past blog from 2014…https://www.yacht-seaclusion.com/cagliari/, and headed as far west as possible that day for 38NM’s, stopping in a beautiful bay called Cala Perdalong, tucking right in behind the rocks with a couple of other yachts, and watching a stunning sunset, before settling in for the night with some nosh and vino, of course!

Cala Perdalong

The next day , we had a great Genoa only sail in an easterly F4/5 to the first of the Islands off the south west coast of Sardinia, called the Sulcis Archipelago, which spans some 160 Square KM’s. Many of the inhabitants of the archipelago are descendants of a coral fishing colony established by Genoese immigrants in 1741, having left a previous colony in Tunisia. It is actually only made up of just two islands, Sant’Antioco, with a population of just under 12,000, over its 109 square kilometers, but in the whole of Sardinia it’s second in size only to Sardinia itself, and is the fourth largest island in Italy, and its smaller sister, San Pietro Island, with its 6000 inhabitants.

Our first stop was a beautiful, if somewhat busy bay on its west coast called Cala Grande, with again stunningly clear turquoise waters. During the afternoon there were day boats rafted up to each other, at times 8 or 10 boats deep, crazy sailors trying to fly a kitesurfer from the back of the moored yacht 🤔, but as the sun set, all pandemonium left the bay and we spent a peaceful night on board.

Cala Grande, Sant’Antioco Island

The next morning, we headed around the top of the bay into the only accessible marina, accessible for yachts with a 2m keel that is, in the town of Calasetta, a) because we had noticed a little issue with our engine that we wanted to get checked out, and b) to catch the bus down to the capital, aptly named Sant´Antioco, knowing Seaclusion was safe. Luckily the mechanic was on hand and he came round quickly, diagnosed the issue as a tiny leak from the engine water pump, nothing to worry about at this stage, besides he didn’t have the parts to fix it and couldn’t get hold of them, it being the August shut down!

With that, we wandered into town, grabbed a quick coffee and then jumped on a bus to Sant Antoico, asking the bus driver to let us know where to get off. 20 minutes later we arrived at what seemed to be the outskirts, and with no comment from the driver, sat tight, until he set off and seemed very much to be driving back out of town! Suffice to say he was very apologetic when we went up to ask him, he said he would drop us of at the next stop to get the return bus back, what he didn’t tell us was the next stop was quite some way of out town, across a bridge that spanned the wet lands surrounding us and heading back to mainland Sardinia!

Depositing us in what seemed to be no mans land, with no shade, all we could do is wait. Still at least we got a shot of the town from afar!

With no bus in sight, we decided to try to hitch… and finally 45 minutes some kind Polish tourists stopped to give us a lift back to the supermarket on the edge of town, a good 15 minutes walk into the centre, no sooner had we climbed into their people carried, the bus went passed.. arggh!

Finally an hour and an half later than intended, we wandered through the streets of Sant´Antioco, said to be pretty with lots of colourful houses and life… hmmm, all we can say was it wasn’t worth the effort..

Sant´Antioca Town

Although our wander was curtailed somewhat when David realised he had left his phone in the people carrier, thankfully on ringing it, they answered and hadn’t left the supermarket yet…. so we pegged it back as fast as we could to retrieve it, then jumped on the bus back to Calasetta, which seemed to be the far prettier and nicer town on the Island. At least it gave us time to do some much needed laundry before having a wander around early evening and finding somewhere to eat!

HAHAHA, well that was no mean feat, and another reminder that it was the Italian holidays. Lucking out on getting a table anytime before 10:30 in the old part, although we did take a reservation at a pizza place for that time, as a precaution, we wondered down to the front and managed to find a delicatessen that also sold wine and charcuterie plates. Very nice it was too, watching the world go by and the sun go down!

However, as David was still hungry, we decided to go back to the main square, where there was a band with lots of life, so decided to grab that table for a pizza. The table didn’t actually become available to almost 11, and after 15 minutes of waiting to be served, we were told that if we wanted pizza, there was at least an hours wait… So guess what David went hungry, still the band wasn’t bad, and the atmosphere was great!

Finally we made our way back to Seaclusion for some much needed kip, and in the morning I went for a walk about to take some pics of the town itself, before we did some provisioning, before setting sail again!