It's been an interesting few days, yesterday in particular. We were on a buoy right in front of the ancient city of Tharros in the Gulf of Ositano since the evening before and had a nice visit to the ancient city in the morning. Not a site one would go out of the way to visit, but still, we were sailing right by and it's some rubble with an interesting history. As many things in Italy, the site is run down. Large placards with explanations of things you are seeing - faded and often unreadable. Stainless steel frames for additional placards - empty. We keep joking that since it's stainless steel, the EU must have paid for it! Things are in better shape here in Sardinia than in Sicily, but not really good either ....

Some impressions of Tharros and Capo San Marco. This is a medieval torre

So we get back to the boat and at 4pm on a Saturday, a Guardia Finanza cutter arrives and comes alongside. Three young males in their 20s or early 30s, nobody speaks a word of English. But we understand: "Can we see the ticket please." We ask: what ticket? I had researched in the cruising guide and online whether you had to pay for the buoy - it didn't say anywhere. You can set your browser to automatically translate websites - so I could actually read the Italian only website for the marine preserve we were in. It mentioned the orange and yellow buoys (typically, without indicating which were for which size boat), but not that we had to pay for them. The buoy itself had some faded writing on it - needless to say that it was unreadable.

The corpus delicti - the mooring buoy. Note what at one point must have been written instructions ....

So with the help of Google translate, we ask them how much is it and how do we pay? They say E10 per day and show me a printed page in Italian which seems to have wire instructions on it. I ask how they think we can pay by wire transfer from the US before we pick up a buoy? Can we pay by credit card? No. We offer cash, but no, they can't take the money. What they can do, however, is write up some citation in Italian and ask me to sign it - for picking up a buoy without advance payment. E334 please. I refuse to pay or sign, of course, and they take off after 90 minutes of useless "conversation". They leave me with the piece of paper and it says I have 30 days to contest the citation. So at least I won't get handcuffed anytime soon!

In fairness, the evening before we had met a guy from the Italian forest police ashore (there are more police forces in Italy than one can imagine) who lectured us about not using the dinghy motor when coming into shore - stressing that it was not his jurisdiction. He had said we needed a ticket for the buoy and when we asked how to pay for it, he said to take a taxi for 3 km into the next town and pay at the park office there. Given the that the office was likely closed on a Saturday, we had ignored the advice, obviously at our own risk.

Before the Guardia Finanza cutter left us, they also showed me a page showing the free anchorage zones near Tharros. So we slipped the buoy and anchored 200 meters away. Had we known about those free anchorage zones, I would have never even picked up the buoy. But the day was not done yet. After dinner, the breeze came up from the SSE and the updated weather files showed 20 knots and more from that direction, the Italian forecast 30 knots. Our anchorage was open to the SSE with at least a 5 mile fetch - not a place to be to spend a quiet night. So in the pitch dark we moved 5 miles to windward, dodging fish farms, to anchor in front of the beach at Torre Grande. Pleasant surprise this morning - the beach looks nice!

It has to be said, however, that yesterday was just one bad day among many great ones. The West Coast of Sardinia is truly a spectacular place, much better than I had expected. We saw dolphins several times - big ones. We passed by a few meters a huge sea turtle which was sunning itself on its back. We anchored in a number of great anchorages and the waters are warming up. Barbara and Siegi go in at 18C, for me it takes 23C. But even I went for a swim a few days ago!

We explored another ancient city, called Nora, which is located right by Capo di Pula where we anchored. Interestingly, we found the same stainless steel frames for explanatory placards at Nora as at Tharros - and the placards were also missing!

Anchorage at Capo di Pula, by the ancient city of Nora

Anchorage at Punto Malfatano, viewed from the top of our little hike

Anchorage at Punto de Laggioni on the West side of the Island of San Pietro

We spent two nights in the town of Carloforte on the island of San Pietro - a delightful town with a delightful and efficient marina.

In Carloforte

But the West Coast of Sardinia can also be a difficult place to sail when the Westerlies blow since there are very few protected anchorages and safe harbors are few and far in between. We had wanted to anchor in Puerto Flavia 15 miles north of Carloforte where there is a spectacular "sugar cone" rock to see. But when we got there, the swells were such that we would have had a very uncomfortable night. As it was too late to continue to the next safe harbor - some 35 miles north, we returned to Carloforte. It is important to download the wave grib files here in Sardinia - we would have had protection from the Northerly breeze but were open to the Westerly swells.

Scoglio Pan di Zuccero - the sugar cone, albeit from the East where it doesn't look like a sugar cone at all!

Deserted loading dock at Puerto Flavia