I ate a horse.

May 29, 2017

I ate a horse.

I'm going to get this out of the way: yes, I did eat horse meat. If you wanna know more details you're gonna have to read through the rest of this blog post.

This evening we returned from a trip to the north of the island, where we visited the towns of Bosa and Alghero.

Cagliari to Alghero

Sunday morning we headed out towards Bosa. By this point the highway out of Cagliari is familiar to me, so I popped in my headphones and put my nose in a book instead of staring out the window (currently reading The Stranger by Camus, if you're interested. So far, it's been... strange). Our first stop was in Bosa, a cute little town by the only navigable river in Sardegna. Our guide informed us that it used to have many tanneries, which are notorious for their stench, but it has cleaned up quite nicely.

Navigable rivers!! Former tannery buildings!! (on the right)

We were in luck, and the town was having a wine festival. We meandered our way up the hilly streets to a broad boulevard right above the castle, and wandered stalls of wine and craft vendors for an hour. Apparently wine festivals are B.Y.O. glass, so despite many offers to sample wines from nice Italian men, I wasn't able to. I picked up a bottle of some orange liqueur, so if you're nice to me and read this blog, I might just share with you when I get back to the states.

It wouldn't be Italy if there weren't Vespas everywhere.

After everyone got the gifts they wanted, we grabbed lunch and headed further north to Alghero. Fifteen minutes into the ride, we pulled over to take in views of the hills next to the water. When I drop my next rap album, just know that you saw my cover art here first.

Trash With Attitude: Straight Outta Cagliari

We proceeded to Alghero and took a group walk around the city, visiting the sea walls and an old church. This area has a long history of conflict, so there are towers, cannons, and catapults all along the wall. The town was absolutely beautiful (as every town has been). The streets were cobblestone, the houses were painted different colors, and there were tons of little shops everywhere. I was surprised to see strings of pink bicycle wheels oddly present everywhere, so I asked our guide about them. He explained the town is the beginning of the Giro d'Italia bike race, so the whole place was decorated from the start of the race a few weeks ago. As a biker, I geeked out a little bit. Plus they made the whole town so pretty.

Strings of bike wheels adore the main plaza

A repurposed bike skeleton at a restaurant

After being sprung to do some more shopping, we got gelato and tried to figure out which touristy gift shops had the best prices. Hint: don't buy something at the first shop you see, because it could cost half as much at another one (sorry Julia). After crossing some names off the list of people to get gifts, we wandered down to the water. The sun set around 8:30 and you bet we were all snapping pictures like mad. It was gorgeous.

We sat down for a meal at 9, which is completely normal in Italian time. Okay, it's the big moment: yes, I did eat horse. One of the main entree options was 'cavallo al griglia', or grilled horse meat. It's part of Sardinian cuisine and I couldn't pass up the opportunity. It was good and tasted pretty much exactly like a beef steak. I slept easy without any equine-related guilt on my conscience.

This post is getting long, so I'll go quickly. This morning we embarked on a boat cruise to see the cliffs west of Alghero. We purred along the rocky coastline, nosing our way into little caves and grottoes with sheer faces towering a hundred meters above us. We navigated to waters that were a little more friendly, with cliffs a little (lot) less steep, and dropped anchor to swim and have lunch. We swam and snorkeled, then enjoyed sun on our skin and pasta in our bellies. It was a relaxing, fun time. After lunch we switched boats and toured Neptune's Caves, a cave system right on the water. The slow shuffle through with hundreds of other tourists gave me plenty of time to think about how freaking cool geology is. My knowledge is limited to the difference between stalactites and stalagmites, but I can still appreciate how beautiful the caves were.