canyon exploring with Michele Angileri

Bacu Tattis

The splendid Codula di Luna is among the main valleys of that part of Sardinia known as Supramonte. It is a wide limestone area. Rock is ancient and extraordinarily compact and white. There are so many pits and caverns, which drain all the water to the underground, leaving no flowing stream on the surface. Many deep rocky valleys and canyons cut the Supramonte, but water flows in them only in case of very heavy showers. The only settlements in this wide area are some isolated folds, far from the roads and now mostly abandoned. Supramonte is a harsh but majestically beautiful land.

The main faults of Supramonte area are oriented north-south (as in the whole southeastern Sardinia). So main valleys, as Codula di Luna, develop parallelly to coastline. Codula di Luna flows in the widest among Supramonte's faults, so wide that granite rocks surface. Waters can flow on granite rock, without going to underground. So the first part of Codula di Luna and its tributaries have some permanent flow. Last part of Codula di Luna develops instead in limestones, and so it have no water flow for the great part of the year. Its bed meanders at the bottom of a majestic canyon, ending to the sea. Its mouth is the famous splendid beach ofCala Luna.

Bacu Tattis reaches Codula di Luna in its most isolated limestone part, far from everything.
More than canyon itself (which might have some water flowing only in case of large floods) it is the majestic, harsh and far beauty of the environment that make this descent unforgettable.

I remember ...

Far from everthing ... You need the will to be here. Gotta have planned every little bit.

Silence ... All around, all over you. The silent sound of an alien world. It cannot be broken by steps or chat. Voices spread and disappear in the wide huge silence.

White limestone ... No grass on it. Junipers, ilexes, mediterranean bush like green islands on a white tormented sea of rock.

The landscape ... The view opens to far woods perched over high walls. Then it encloses in a white meander in rock. Then it opens again on the huge boulders of a very ancient landslide. Then ...

Codula ... There's much flow here! This is really unusual: water uses to flow in underground's karst tunnels and halls, but we had very much rain this winter, and so the underground reservoirs are full! Emerald water flows in daylight, between canyon's white walls.

The return ... It's not easy finding the path. No signs, only weak ambiguous traces on the rocks. The hope to keep away from blackberry bushes, far from walls. Path is long and the ground is hard for feet and legs.

The car, at last! ... Cramping legs are telling us tomorrow will be dedicated to light hiking or resting.

Photographs in this website show ultralight ropes (6 mm ropes made of high tenacity fibers). Read multimedia book Ultralight ropes canyoning technique to learn how to use them.

Copyright © 2002- Michele Angileri. All rights reserved.