Wild boar sandwiches - June 11, 2025

SUMMARY Visited the river source of Sorgente Su Gologone (a spring) on a nice little hike. Grocery shopped and did laundry. Happy hour at the highly rated nearby restaurant/bar/gas station/carwash. Dinner at Snoopy on the waterfront. - Karen

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DETAIL Me? Today I’m up early. Maybe I’m still worried about my missing iPhone. I message Captain Kevin from yesterday’s boat cruise. He can’t find it. Can I possibly make it chirp, from here? As I try I see that Apple FindMy now says it’s here, with me, 30 yards away. It must be in the car. Yay! Everyone else is still asleep. I try to check the car, but the gate is locked. I don’t realize I need a key to let myself out. Once everyone’s awake I am able to verify that I do have my precious iPhone. Yay!

For our breakfast at home this morning we still just have our food from last night. Fruit, breads, cookies, wine, beer and champagne. We must go to the grocery store today!

Late in the morning we finally head out to lunch. At the top of the seven sharp hairpin switchbacks we stop at a place called Chiosco Monte Longu. Every Italian word, pretty much, ends in a vowel. Remove the vowel and maybe you can guess the English word. Monte Longu becomes Mont Long, or “Mount Long”. The CH sound is like our K, so Chiosco becomes Kiosc or “kiosk”, so it’s the Kiosk at the base of Mount Long. Who says Italian is hard.

The place is great, busy and well stocked. It’s a tiny bar/restaurant that is doing a land office business. Our hostess recommended it and she didn’t steer us wrong. We order pizza and a salad, beer and some wine. Our hunger overcomes our desire for ABI (anything but Italian).

After lunch, we continue our drive, this time towards “Sorgente Su Gologone”, a famous (?) fresh water spring. On the drive there it’s super hazy. We ask ChatGPT and learn that this not uncommon haze is a combination of a bunch of factors, including agricultural burning, dust from Sahara and  natural oils from the local trees. In any case, it’s quite hazy.

At Su Gologone there’s lots of campers and cars. It’s another popular place. There are lots of Eucalyptus trees and thus lots of shade. We park and pay for our entry. It’s normally 2 euros per person but given that we’re so old (over 65) so they let us in for 1.5 euros each.

In addition to the spring there’s an outdoor exhibit of artsy masks hung on all the trees near the restaurant/bar. Each has an explanation (in three languages) of what local superstition each represents.

On to the spring! It’s very cool, both visually and temperature wise. The water is super clear. We’ve been warned: No Swimming. We can see how people might be tempted. There’s a big panel nearby explaining about of the various scuba diving expeditions have been done here, over the years, to figure out how far and how deep these underwater caves go. Spoiler alert: very far and very deep. We’ll have to take their word for it.

Eventually it’s time to go but there’s a big chugging tractor, without driver, parked right behind our car. The driver is off having a coffee/cigarette/coke break. He returns, coffee and coke in hand and cigarette in mouth and clears our path.

On our drive back we stop and shop. It’s a really great supermarket. Clean, with great selection and not crowded. We’re thinking it is, in part, catering to all us tourists coming to enjoy the area.

As we’re once again going down the seven twisty, windy hairpin turns we spot quite a few para-gliders, floating down from on high. Despite the challenging drive, Tom eventually does find somewhere for us to pullover to watch.

Back home we do laundry and enjoy a little chill time. We have our requisite happy hour and then head off to dinner. Where to go, where to go?? We eventually decide to try the place that’s really close. Depending on which source you read it’s great or it sucks. It’s a restaurant and a bar. It’s also a gas station and also a 24 hour car wash. What the online menu says nothing about is that there are only shrunk wrapped sandwiches or stuff from the cooler after 3pm. We get wine and (it being happy hour) they give us complementary sandwiches (white bread, cheese and luncheon meat, with the crusts cut off). We eat a couple of them, after which the girls smuggle them outside to throw down to the ever growing family of wild boars. As each sandwich is thrown, the mommy boar forcefully pushes the kids out of the way (maybe so they don’t get hit by the dangerous sandwich, or — more likely — so mommy can eat the food herself). Such a pig!

Having struck out on our first try, we venture on, way down to the marina where we get into Snoopy’s Restaurant Pizzeria. It’s pretty good, very quick, and a real price performer.

Next: How do we get home? Bus? Uber? Taxi? No, our only option is to walk. 27 minutes, up a fairly steep hill. At home, the ever-efficient Tom and Cindy put the refuse-du-jour out. Tonight it’s compost. They put the bin on the ground outside the gate. None of us think about there being wild boars close nearby. Our hostess spots our error and quietly moves the bin before the boars arrive. Ah country life.

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Photos

We arrived late last night and couldn't really see much. Looking at the map, now, I see that those seven, long hairpin turns we did at 10 pm really were a big sharp.

Where we're staying. We have the main (first) floor and the one below it. Our hostess is in the upper floor.

A touristy map of where we are. We're on the water. We'll be renting a boat tomorrow and motoring arount most of this semicircle. Supposedly there are lots of grottos (caves) and lots of high, white cliffs. We'll be going inland a bit, but from the map we see there's a lot more fun stuff (read hiking?) around here.

At the top of the switchbacks is this little nothing hole-in-the-wall. Chisoco translates to Kiosk and Monte Longu is Mount Long, maybe visible just above. Quality, fun place.

The view down to the water, and our town Cala (Beach) Galonone. It's hazy but what can you do.

Good pizza and salad (and beer).

At the Su Gologone spring they have an art exhibition going on. The masks are interesting, but the superstitious are even more so. So many crazy notions. Not sure if there's one for our current head of HHS (where the old superstition is "Vaccines are bad"). Crazy world then and now.

Us, of course, with the spring just behind us, that dark thing on the ground.

The spring itself, with the water gushing out from the ground. It's big and perfectly clear which doesn't make for a great picture. We can see how they have to tell visitors that you're not allowed to swim.

Driving back down the twisty-turny switchbacks we spot paragliders floating lazily down from the mountaintop. Apparently the updrafts from the water keep them in the air a long time.

An archeological map of Sardinia. Here we see where we've been (starting in Alghero on the left coast) up to Palau at the top right, and now in Cala Ganone, that gapeing mouth at the bottom right. So much to see on this island. I suspect the coastline is the place to be, but who knows? From where the ancient structures have been found, it seems the people from long ago were everywhere.

Walking to dinner we enjoyed the views of the surrounding mountains and the alpenglow. Sunset is around 9 pm these days and it stays light much later than that. Ten days til the longest day of the year.

Off for dinner maybe? Close to where we're staying. A restaurant, bar, and gas station, oh and 24-hour car wash. We hear the food is good, but elsewheres we hear it's not good. The view from this place is very good.

We order and get wine. What we don't expect are these complementary happy hour sandwiches. They're OK, but Tom and I only have about one (maybe two each). The girls aren't willing to go there.

The girls are happy to throw the sandwiches down to the waiting wild boars, behind the bar/restaurant/gas station/car wash. Apparently these guys are a big draw at this place, but also a big nussance for the local home owners. They're indescriminant in what plants they dig up in your yard.

And being the Meditterean there are lots of healthy plants. Olives, of course, and as shown here Bouganvilla, lemons, and oleander. We can see how early travelers were happy to export these to the US west coast and everywhere else.

On the walk home, we saw the full moon through the Saharan haze, reflecting off the water.

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