Ok we have had the blow on blow account of the sailing and now you are wondering what we did all winter… well we did go sailing once or twice just for a change (coals to Newcastle and all that!) but mostly we just enjoyed ourselves on land.
I filled a lot of my time trying to learn Italiano and even
had 20 hours or so of one on one Italian lessons… (Grazie mille Francesco – you
were a star to put up with me and it won’t be for lack of trying on your behalf
if I can’t make myself understood ;-) If
you want to learn Italiano this is your man.).
At least now I can tell the doggie dottore of Bramble’s many adventures
and explain the resulting incidenti. As
you know trips to the vet do tend to be one of our more common and important
social outings! All jokes aside it has
paid off with some thrilling moments of near fluency (yeah right!). I am sure the frustratingly spacey moments I
suffer when people are talking to me will diminish as my brain finally manages
to think in two languages. Either that
or I may just have to resort to going completely native or employ a
shrink! Another odd side effect I have
discovered is that I do indeed have some sort of strange filing system in my
napper and occasionally French, Greek and even Turkish emerge when searching
under files labelled ‘basic greetings’ much to the amazement for all
concerned. Important note for would be
linguists; try not to think of anything but the language you are trying to use
or these slip ups get more frequent and make you appear even more mad than
normal!Murray declined the invitation to jump in the language pool but despite this picked up enough to make the occasional joke down the pub which lets face it is just as important as being able to ask if a shop sells lemon and ginger tea.
We also had many excursioni into the hinterland. Stupendo!!
Sardegna is an undiscovered walker’s paradise as far as I am concerned
and will probably remain that way as the maps and guidebooks are as much use as
“tette su un toro”! But we persevered and had great tramps in the Monte Albo,
Supramonte as well as the more local area. One of the highlights was a gut busting walk
up, around, down, and finally up to Tiscali… When Paddy’s guide said turn left
at the overhang it obvious now he meant that one way back there at the top of
the first slog… you know the one! È stato bellissimo! Can’t rave enough about it really but I won’t as I don’t want you all come at once and overcrowd the place! Bramble also enjoyed flushing out for our viewing pleasure a myriad of goats and muflon and even allowed herself to be used as bait to attract some of the larger birds of prey. What a team player! (Well all the tortoises were kipping so she had nothing better to do.)
The arrival of various friends also made time fly with more excursioni
to showcase Sardinia’s best assets and we thoroughly enjoyed all our trips to
Biddibo’s, a must do part of anyone vacanza. Mario and Nicoletta produce some
of Sardinian best fast food; if only the wine didn’t flow so freely! We can see now why the Sardi take three hours
for lunch, although I don’t think we managed a visit that was less than four! Just in case you are in Olbia and want to
check it out it is the ristorante opposite the main post office entrance.
I think it is appropriate here to thank Mark and Rosita off “FYA”
for introducing us to Mario’s in the first place and for providing us with much
needed company every now and then. Un
abbraccione you two – I hope the American adventure is living up to all your
expectations. Ci vediamo ancora…
Other time consuming winter exploits involved:
Tortoise research and rescue… particularly in the aftermath
of cyclone Cleopatra. (For those that
didn’t notice, Sardegna was hit by a deadly cyclone back in November which
killed 18 people and drowned large parts of Olbia – on a boat in the marina
turned out to be one of the safest places to be.) Many tortoises tried to circumvent evolution that
day and reinvent themselves as turtles overnight. Luckily they are a surprising hardy bunch and
we were fishing them out with no ill effects up to a week later. Now there is a nice little breeding
population established in the scrub behind the marina.
Italian Post… it turns out that anything to do with posting
or receiving a parcel is a fun filled, near all-day event. First take a numbered ticket… wait at least
one hour to make it to the head of the queue (or if you are Murray, take time
out and a quick caffe at Biddibo)… struggle for the hour with all the
paperwork, photocopying of said paperwork, stamping of said paperwork… bagging,
stapling and sellotaping of said paperwork…. (here it pays to have made friends
with at least three groups of people behind you in the queue so it is in their
best interest to help out on the language front if needs be and needs will be
because, at some point, it will be noticed that you have incorrectly filled out
a form regarding something vitally important (per esempio : you only wrote down
“lollipops” not “4 lollipops”) and you will be danger of having the death
penalty evoked or worse still having to go to the back of the queue
again!). The last bit is easy enough
though just hand over all the cash you have on you in return for a slightly
mangled receipt and a limp piece of paper with some sort of barely legible scrawling’s
on it. All that is left is to “incrocia
le dita” and hope for the best… mamma mia!! And don’t even get Murray started
on the arrivals procedure and the numerous “false alarm” trips and money it takes
to get them out of hock! No wonder the
postal service once put all the back logged post on a ship and sunk it in the
Med… By the way Christmas is cancelled this year…
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| My new dogs... |
Il Dottore… Now I think this system is actually something
that they have got right here… if you have the money to take advantage of it…
In the wake of a rather over blown Christmas season I decided to have the
plumbing checked and turns out you can go straight to the top as it were. So with some trepidation I had Maria book me
an appointment for the dead of night, (who goes to the doctor at 9.30 at night?
– me it turns out!), and duly turned up at a very uninspiring door. However, I was pleasantly surprised to discover
that not only did il dottore has suitable small hands, but was also an extremely efficient and highly trained surgeon
and even though he didn’t speak any passable English, he was able to reassure I
was not in any danger of imminent death.
To top it off I managed to reduce the bill with my newly acquired
language skills which let me down just enough to mistake “scontrino” – receipt
with “sconto” - discount which produced the nett result of a 30€ reduction.
Cultural events… including a food and wine festival and the
carnevale – both excellent fun and at times slightly eerie with shaggy men
bedecked with clanging bells stomping their way through the streets urged on by
white masked whipper-in’s.
Craft brewers… You know what beer snobs we can be and so we
were rapt to discover that there are around 15 or so birrifico artigianale (of
which P3 and Lara again spring to mind) – who knew they grow hops here and
brewed such great beer?
Trips to the high mountain villages… all memorable but we
particularly enjoyed Mamioada (home of the mamuthones and issohadores),
Orgosolo (the so called bandit capital, renown for it political murals, bullet
ridden signs and home to “Sa e Jana” a small quirky family run hotel and
associated ristorante, bar and pizzeria – go there… it worth it just to meet
the lovely people running this place), Gavoi (awesome “cioccolata calda”)
and Fonni (the highest village in
Sardegna). Just loved that drive through
unexpectedly heavy snow to see them all again in early March before we left.
And what else can I say?
For once it will be hard to leave.
Overwintering here has been a breeze.
I have fallen in love with this beautiful island and its people. We will be back and thankfully Sardegna seems
to have just the right timeless quality which means she may well still be here
in all her glory waiting for us… that’s if the Italians don’t sell her to
Switzerland to pay off debts, but that’s a whole other storia!
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