Santa Maria Navarrese grew around a church and a cluster of olive trees which local signage describes as a thousand years old — a claim worth verifying, but one that captures the relationship between this stretch of coast and its vegetation. A Spanish-era coastal tower closes the beach to the south.
Visitors who come for the sea tend to stay on the beach. Those who come to understand the coast use the harbour instead: dinghies and boats leave Santa Maria northwards for Cala Mariolu, Cala Biriala and Cala Goloritzé — the only way to see the cliff front of the Gulf of Orosei in sequence.
