After a fabulous few days enjoying the beaches and rocky cliffside hikes in Santa Teresa di Gallura and Capo Testo, we headed East to Cala Gonone.  Sardinia’s most beautiful beaches are found on this part of the island, so I was very excited to discover this side after our amazing days in the North!

The drive from Santa Teresa di Gallura to Cala Gonone is about 2.5 hours, and you’ll traverse back through the mountains, through Olbia, and through more mountains along your drive.  The East is known for gorgeous beaches that are only accessible by boat and that’s because the mountainside goes right up to the coast.  When we were 10-15 minutes out from our seafront hotel but still very much in the mountains, I started to get worried we plugged in the wrong address!  With about 5 minutes driving time left, we went through some switchbacks and landed right along the sea, it was pretty impressive!

Cala Gonone Town

You’ll want your home base to be the flower-filled town Cala Gonone.  It’s on the Bay of Oresei and has a marina port with multiple ferry boats to shuttle you to different beaches, a blue cave, or where you can rent your own boat for the day, which is a must!

We stayed at Hotel Conchara, which was right on the water and included a good breakfast buffet spread, and had a restaurant on – site serving lunch and dinner.  We had an easy 10 minute walk to the port, which was clutch as this serves as your access to the beaches each day.  There are a few parallel parking spots you can snag for free and we didn’t have an issue finding one.

Cala Luna

We opted to take the ferry to Cala Luna the day that we arrived since we drove in the morning and didn’t have a full day.  We caught the 3pm ferry which still gave us plenty of beach time.  The ferries leave almost every hour and take you to Cala Luna or Cala Mariolou.  You can’t go wrong with either beach as they are both beautiful!  The timing worked for us to catch the boat to Cala Luna today.  I also highly recommend saving one full day to rent a boat of your own, but the ferry is a great option for an easy hassle free beach day!

I started snapping pictures immediately as the ferry started to glide on the water, it was sooo gorgeous!

Cala Luna is the largest beach in the area and full of sand and pebbles as you approach the water.  To the right of you are large cliffs, in front a beautiful aqua sea, and the to the left is a large stretch of sand and a series of caves, some accessible by beach! n We had a fun day relaxing, exploring our surroundings, and taking a dip in the gorgeous water.

This beach is easy to spot by sea because it has a ton of caves just before you reach it.  The caves are pretty unique in that they are right on the beach, and you can even duck into them to get out of the sun and relax.  We explored one of the closest caves.  Some of the neighboring caves become sea bound as the tide changes!

This beach isn’t located on a cliff, but has a really Jurassic Park looking green land behind it – something we thought was pretty unreal!  This whole island at times had reminded us of a far off land.  Sardinia is just mesmerizing to me.

We caught the ferry back to Cala Gonone just before the sun started to set, and had a wonderful dinner in town at a fresh seafood restaurant da Graziano il Pescatore.

The next day in Cala Gonone we rented our very own boat to sail the seas and stop at our very own beaches.  Can’t wait to share.

xo