Before I explain, I will fill you in on yesterday's adventures. Woke late (it's becoming a habit) and made my way to Valledoria to have a swim at San Pietro beach, but arrived to find there had been a huge concert at the beach the night before and they were in the process of cleaning up. So went to town to check out the local markets, especially the Peccorino cheeses. This cheese comes from the local sheep who graze on the diverse pastures around Sardinia hence its distinctive taste and smell. After a number of free samples (each of them very different depending upon how long the cheese had been aged and the diet), I then drove up the coast to Isola Rossa (or Red Island) for some lunch and checked out the round watch tower from the 1500's.
Today was much more interesting as I visited the Olivastri Millenari. Standing 14 meters tall with a trunk that measures 20 meters in circumference, the Patriarca Verde, or “Green Patriarch,” is estimated to be 3,800 years old, making it one of the oldest trees in the world. While the green giant (a female tree) is fenced off to prevent you from hanging on her branches, she neighbours a much younger male wild olive tree (a mere 2,500 years old). This part of Sardinia is known as the Gallura region and the drive passed some enormous granite outcrops and kind of looks like a lunar landscape. In fact it's called the plain of the big stones! My final stop for the day was The Giants' Grave of Coddu Vecchiu. By this stage I think I have seen enough rocks so it was a quick look then onto Olbia my home for the next three days.
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