Inland Ogliastra and the hill belt between the coast and the limestone tacchi.

All year; spring and autumn are the best times for walking through the old centres.

Section

Villages

Hillside villages, plain villages, abandoned villages: settlement in Ogliastra follows rock and water.

Via Marconi in Gairo Vecchio, among the emptied houses — Photo: trolvag · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons

In east Sardinia villages almost always sit some distance from the sea. That is not accidental: for centuries the coast was exposed and unhealthy, and settlement favoured slopes and springs.

Gairo Vecchio is the extreme case: a village abandoned after the 1951 flood because of unstable ground. Here the relationship between settlement and terrain is still legible at a glance.

The essential answers

Where is it?: Inland Ogliastra and the hill belt between the coast and the limestone tacchi.
When to go?: All year; spring and autumn are the best times for walking through the old centres.
Where to stay?: Triei is itself one of these villages: staying at I Mandorli means sleeping in the farming fabric rather than in a resort area.