Baunei

Baunei sits on the southern flank of the Supramonte, the village on its ridge and its coast forty kilometers below, a stretch reachable only by boat or on foot and belonging entirely to the commune. Santa Maria Navarrese is the only seaside frazione, a small bay with a Romanesque church that serves as harbor for boat trips along the gulf. Inland and above, the limestone plateau carries free-grazing goats, a deep karst sinkhole, and the chapel of San Pietro, a different register of the same terrain that drops to cliffs at the shore.

The coast itself is a sequence: a cove of polished white pebbles a few points north of the arch beach, the needle marking the southern end near Santa Maria Navarrese, and another cove further along, the two points bracketing the long trekking route sketched in 1987 by photographer Mario Verin and alpinist Peppino Cicalò. The territory falls inside the Parco Nazionale del Golfo di Orosei e del Gennargentu. What holds the village, plateau, and coast together is the same limestone, worked by the sea into coves and arches below and by karst into a sinkhole and plateau above.

From Cagliari (CAG), about 3h 26m by car.