The Logudoro in northern Sardinia is a high, rolling country of basalt plateaus and the worn cones of extinct volcanoes, where cork oaks and wild olives stand in dry pasture and every second hill seems to have a ruined nuraghe on it. Petroglyph Park-b lies near the small villages of Cheremule, Giave and Torralba, in an area where the rock itself was used as an archive, carved into tombs and marked with symbols by people who lived here thousands of years before Rome.
The famous monuments around here are the domus de janas, the houses of the fairies, chamber tombs cut into rock outcrops in the Neolithic and Copper Age. Some have several rooms, false doors and carved details imitating wooden houses, and a few in this area show bull's horns in relief, a symbol of fertility and power that recurs across prehistoric Sardinia. The rides that pass here connect several of these sites, from Anghelu Ruju near Alghero to Mesu 'e Montes near Ossi, which together with others were inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2025.
Torralba, a few kilometres away, is the base for Nuraghe Santu Antine, one of the most impressive nuraghi on the island, a Bronze Age tower complex built from huge blocks without mortar. The so called Valle dei Nuraghi stretches around it. Fill your water bottle before you explore; shade is scarce, and from June to September the sun is relentless, with temperatures that make a leather jacket a test of character.
The riding is a pleasure once you leave the SS131, the four-lane spine that runs from Cagliari to Porto Torres. The minor roads across the plateau curve between stone walls and cork woods, climb onto basalt tablelands with long views, and drop into small villages with steep, narrow centres. Surfaces vary, and grit, gravel and cattle are part of the deal. Spring, when the fields are green and full of flowers, is the finest season, and autumn is good too.
These are tiny villages, so do not count on fuel in each one. Stations line the SS131 and the bigger towns such as Ittiri, eighteen kilometres off, have reliable services. Food in the Logudoro is shepherd's food at its best: pecorino, roast lamb or piglet, and pane carasau, the thin crisp bread that keeps for weeks in a saddlebag.