Porto Rafael Shire

If after an intense day at the beach you feel nostalgic for the old farmhouse in central Italy where you used to spend summer, and you feel like sipping the excellent wine your grandfather used to get, never been able to drink elsewhere; if today you wish to sit once more under your figs, listening the farmer saying anecdotes about your family, even if always the same and repeated hundreds times; in short, if you would like to swap perfect sunset which stands now in front of Villa Aidan with a less performing sun, when it intertwines with trees and breaks behind the hills, releasing long and shady twilights; well, do not abandon the island. It is our duty to inform you that the farmhouse of your childhood is now surrounded by anonymous residential complexes delimiting city boundaries, which are now close and looming. Under the fig trees there is no longer the long wooden plank on which you struggled with school homework, before having a break with large slices of tasteless bread and novel oil. The large space is now a parking for visitors, and where stables were, it opened a mediocre restaurant, stormed by herds of people looking for souvenirs.

Your ancestors and places history, those plots which have delivered you to the present as novel seedlings with strong and invisible roots, has become a concise learned by heart summary repeated by a local guide (to tell the truth it was much more exciting and believable in farmer's mouth). In short, when you feel tired of Maddalena archipelago, but when even breaking news from continent are discouraging, not far from Porto Rafael a scenographic apparatus will take action in real time to disperse any melancholy, along a rural itinerary through main Sardinia's wine estates, which will return you almost all your memories intact. In a naturalistic context among soft hills, steep woods and rocky mountains, hardly believing surrounded by the sea, you can spend peaceful hours listening to fairy tales repeated to the bitter end, after the owner of the estate will meet you with an open smile to welcome you. He will tell you about his great-grandfather who decided as a joke to allocate part of the land to grapes, when wine only satisfied his family needs and those of the closest community; he will light up like a child in recalling the moment when he sensed he could dare more; he will talk about his first investments and expansions, travels up and down the island, when stocks  began to run low, and orders to increase. He will amaze you with his impeccable English, apologizing for appearing tired, but he just landed from Hong Kong, and will leave for Berlin in a few days.

However, he will never reveal which his secret ingredienti is, the one now dancing in your mouth inside a sip of Cannonau. Within few kilometres, restless and competitive like brothers from different fathers, local winemakers vie for mother earth's love with creativity and perfectionism, which today make Sardinian wines an excellence all over the world. In Olbia – Tempio area, crossing province of Arzachena, Porto Cervo and Luogosanto, there are some of the most prestigious wineries on the island: Capichera, Cantina delle Vigne, Vigne Surrau, Tenute Olbios, Siddura and, worthy of particular note, Concaentosa winery. If you pass by here at after-hours time, you may come across Nicolina returning from orchard. If she likes you, she may prepare you some gnocchi with sweet tomato sauce followed by omelettes, cold cuts and excellent pecorino cheese.  She will uncork the most expensive label proposing a toast  in your honor, under terrified gaze of his son Emanuele, who has officially taken over the reins of the company: as he knows his mother, he knows she won't stop at a single bottle .

Nicolina,  landowner who as a young woman competed with males in underwater fishing, who horrifies by any form of female submission, catches her son's dismay and out of the blue informs the guests today matriarchy still exists in Sardinia. In a calm tone of voice, as clear as her blue eyes, then she adds, without giving weight, that until proven otherwise everything sorrounding them far as the eye can see belongs to her: they sound like words of an archaic divinity, while it is the truth. You will return to Porto Rafael seduced by Nicolina and sober, as if by a spell, which will persist even the next day, when you will start to call Villa Aidan "my country estate", creating confusion around you. Then Nicolina will get tired of keeping tabs on you, she will murmur two magic words and you will see the sea again, which has never moved from there anyway.