January 21, 2018
Valeria was my bike tour guide. She told me that while Sardinia is part of Italy, she said Sardinian think of themselves as Sardinian, not Italian. She told me a few words in Sardinian, which has many words in common with Spanish, rather thsn Italian as Spain ruled Sardinia for over a century.
Valeria was a biology major at University who studied birds, so we decided to go to the salt flats outside of town to do some bird watching. We saw birds called stilts(1), and she was very excited to see a purple swamp hen, which apparently are not very common.
We then rode to the beach and stopped at a cafe with a nice view of the devil's saddle, then up the hill to the lighthouse and a panoramic view of Spanish-era watchtowers, fortifications from the Napoleonic era and a nice view of the city of Cagliari. The ride back to town was a bit if a slog, as there were fierce Mistral (north) winds in our face.
Back at the shop, I saw a nice shirt that was actually made on Sardinia, and had a pre-Christian era symbol for heart. I was unsure what size to get for my wife (European sizes are different). I showed Valeria a picture of my wife. Valeria said she thought was tge same size as my wife. Valeria then tried on the shirt to test whether it would also fit my wife.
The Basilica of Saint Saturnina dates from the 500s and honors a local Christian martyr. I took a quick look, then hopped on the train for a short ride to the airport and my flight home.
(1) As the name would suggest, they have very long legs that allow them to stand in the water.
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