Stunning Sardinia as the season ends

I need to switch Siri off, the nosy bitch!. I didn't realise until quite recently that your ad recommendations on social can be influenced by the listening phone. Mega creepy! But in this instance, listening served me well and about six months ago, my social media feeds were bombarded with images of the most beautiful tropical looking beaches. All fingers pointed in the direction of Sardinia as a possible place to visit.

This was reinforced by a number of people who I had met and recommended the place highly as well. But our next opportunity where we would have a little more than a few days to visit somewhere like this was in the October half term.

Notoriously weather can be a little unpredictable in this region at that time of year and so I spent quite a while mulling over where we should go. Quite quickly however flight prices to anywhere escalated and many destinations became unaffordable for a budget traveller.

But having decided on Sardinia over another October half term trip to Ibiza with August, in the interests of trying to see somewhere new and adding to the list of places that he had been lucky enough to encounter in his young life, we opted for Sardinia and set about trying to make it a cheapie. Lots of playing about on Skyscanner indicated that it would probably not be possible to fly directly on the return, but the connections via cities like Milan and Turin were really good and didn't really add significant time to the journey.

Admittedly I didn't really invest as much time as I should have done in the trip research. I just figured it's an island, on a map it doesn't look that much bigger than Sicily, although I couldn't really remember Sicily, and I really don't like staying in one place for too long, so why not try and see as much of it as we can? So we ended up with a flight, from Stanstead, as per, into Cagliari in the South, and the return out of Olbia in the north. Hire cars were inexpensive and so that was our means of transport but at no point prior to landing in Sardinia did I actually plot the journey time between the two places, and my nervousness increased as we took about 30 minutes to pass from the North to the South Coast. Perhaps I had dropped a clanger on this one. But upon landing, the estimated journey time was three hours which is nothing for us really.

Not knowing the island, we were not necessarily led by wanting to stay in a particular place because all of the imagery around the island looked similarly superb. So I was led by the cost and quality of the available accommodation on booking.com. We could have secured seven nights accommodation incredibly cheaply, as low as 30 pounds I think it was, for seven nights, staying in a guest house. But the map suggested that this could be in the middle of nowhere.

I was blown away, and decided to splurge a little more than I ordinarily would do when I came across the Sighientu Resort Thalasso & Spa which worked out to about 48 pounds per night for a double room including breakfast. What particularly appealed was the huge beautiful free form pool and the prospect of an indoor pool with spa, particularly for my little man who had developed a love of jacuzzis on our visit to Zakopane. Unfortunately the age limit was 16 and above on that pool, although we never saw anybody in there.

The hotel was four-star. The location was beach front, and the facilities and cleanliness was superb. I can't fault the hotel at all. The reason for the cheapness quickly became clear however, that pretty much everything around it was closed, and in fact I suppose this is the only minus on this accommodation choice, that there are limited opportunities other than the Marina restaurant adjacent to it for easy to walk to eating options other than the hotel. Doesn't matter how nice the hotel is, is still doesn't sit comfortably with me to just stay within its confines for the entire visit. Luckily we had the car to get out and about and we visited some of the stunning beaches in the South East corner of the island.

We had four nights at the first hotel. I wasn't overly enamoured with the area that the hotel was located in and the outskirts of Cagliari in particular, but driving through Cagliari one day, the city itself looked very nice although we didn't have the time to visit it. Worth a look on a return visit.

Knowing now what I know, I would have opted for three nights in Cagliari and 4 in Olbia. It was a very pleasant drive up to the North East, the Costa Esmeralda near San Teodoro. This felt more like a holiday area, although still many shops and restaurants were closed for the winter. Nevertheless, there was more choice than the previous location.

A word on driving in Italy. Mental. I think that sums it up appropriately. I've driven a lot in Italy and find it particularly challenging, although as the week progressed became far more comfortable with it. Not just the nature of Italian drivers, but more so how bloody confusing the roads are, twists and turns in every direction leads to panic mode.

But the drive up to the north was very pleasant indeed and the roads were quiet. Our second stop for the three nights was residents Residence Hotel Lu Nibareddu, about 5 minutes drive from San Teodoro and slightly in land, although you could walk down to the closest beach which was about 1 kilometre away. These were apartments, and it made me realise just how much more I favour apartments over a hotel stay, especially when travelling with children.

Just the addition of a fridge to keep snacks and drinks cool and save some money. Out of the three nights we only ate in the apartment once, after some grappling with the gas hob and recruited support from some neighbours I managed to rustle up a delicious seafood linguine with the ingredients procured from the wonderful Eurospin supermarket from which I also procured some dodgy black hair dye upon August’s request to ‘look like an Italian lady’.

But it's just great to have that option and to be able to have breakfast at the apartment and a little more of a leisurely start, should that be an option with a small child. We spent a number of blissful days visiting some of the best beaches in Sardinia that were located near to the area that we were staying, Porto Istana, Lu Imposto, Cala Brandicini. We particularly loved Porto Istana. It had the most crystal clear water and soft fine sand and was one of the most peaceful and tranquil places I think I visited, inevitably this peacefulness was interrupted through the repeated demands to play dob or machine guns or build sandcastles or for various food or snack items, but that's all part of the joy, and exhaustion. I imagine the place would be a very different place in peak season. So we were lucky to experience it as it was.

The flight back was routed via Turin. We flew the first leg with Volotea from Olbia to Turin. I was really impressed. As an Italian low cost carrier we were boarded and ready to go on the Airbus A320 with slick efficiency and some particularly hot cabin crew 30 minutes ahead of schedule. The connection in Turin was easy and we had time to kill and dinner to eat before the final leg with Ryanair from Turin to Stanstead.

I'm even starting to become quite fond of the journey between Nottingham and Stanstead and I've got it down to about two hours, traffic permitting. I no longer hate the M11. A necessity perhaps on account of Stanstead being consistently the cheapest place to fly from and with the greatest range of destinations. The long stay car park is a ball ache however but sometimes the only one that is anywhere near affordable.

So what were my overall thoughts? I really loved Sardinia, and the beaches. It makes a great family destination. But even August started to tire of it being a beach based holiday, and it probably would have been good to spend some nights in one of the cities to give us a bit of variety. There are also notably some archaeological attractions and a flourishing agro tourism industry. So there is diversity to be had, I think with small children beach is sometimes seen the easier option. For me Sardinia didn't have the magic of an island that Ibiza has and actually didn't to me have an island feel. I think if I'm gonna choose future island destinations they would be smaller so that you would be able to feel like you could see more of them but that's just a personal preference. The beaches are amongst the best I've ever seen and perfect for young children, gently shelving. Go self-catering, it gives you the option to save money and cater for different culinary tastes should you so wish.

To try and save money during school holidays, it's worthwhile looking at indirect flights, that could bring the price down but not necessarily bump the total travel duration up to greatly and this also could potentially afford you the opportunity to fly from an airport that is closer to you. If searching on Skyscanner there's the option to search for either direct or indirect flights, and then you can filter according to price or total travel duration. Car hire is a great way to have the freedom to get about and really see the destination. But don't get caught out and screwed like we did. If you don't want to pay the full insurance, and quite typically car hire companies will try every trick to ensure that you do because it's the basis upon which they earn their commission, you must make sure that your pin works for your credit card and that there is a suitable credit limit on it. However, with the madness of Italian driving, you may feel that the fully comp insurance is a worthwhile investment. Another smaller recommendation is to make sure you take some serious mosquito repellent with you. I have never experienced anything like it, we were literally eaten alive, and the supermarkets didn't really seem to have any decent repellent available.

From August’s perspective there were loads of takeaways. This just underlines the educational value of travel for anyone but particularly young children in their formative years. The opportunity to try different cuisine and develop your confidence in trying new things; To peel a prawn and suck out its brains. To have the available time to devote to swimming practise to the extent that you can swim a length of the pool at the end of the week. To develop your navigation skills in being the co-pilot of the car hired and practise your reading skills. Whilst flying, to talk about the different cloud formations and the impact of these upon air turbulence. To know how to make a pizza. To be able to say hello in multiple different languages on account of the new friends that you've made whilst being on holiday. To understand how freight is moved internationally through airport logistics. The list goes on.