Foxilioni

White sand stacks into small dunes behind Foxilioni, and flat, polished granite slabs run into water clear enough to count fish. This strand on Tortolì's Lido di Orrì shoreline includes Le Piscinette, a string of rock-enclosed sea pools by its southern rocks.

Why it matters

Foxilioni’s white sand builds into small dunes behind the shore, while flat, smooth granite slabs mark the meeting of rock and sea. The beach belongs to the long Lido di Orrì shoreline, just south of a small green promontory, fringed by Mediterranean vegetation and centuries-old junipers. A shallow sandy seabed contrasts with the rocky edges of the cove.

What to notice

Low rock formations and flat emergent slabs divide Foxilioni into two sections. At the southern end, a gap in the rocks opens onto Le Piscinette, small sea pools enclosed by stone.

Watch the sand's behaviour. Behind the shoreline it climbs into low dunes rather than a flat berm — unusual on this stretch of coast — and the centuries-old junipers pin it in place. Where granite crosses the beach, the slabs are level and worn smooth, warm underfoot and pale against the white sand.

Inland, the archaeological park of S’Ortali ’e su Monti preserves pre-Nuragic and Bronze Age remains, including domus de Janas tombs, a megalithic circle, a nuraghe, village remains and a Giants’ Tomb.

Context and history

Foxilioni sits on the sixteen-kilometre ribbon of shore that carries the Lido di Orrì name, the sequence of coves running south from Tortolì toward Barisardo. Its neighbours are a roll call of this coast: Le Piscinette at its southern rocks, Cala Ginepro tucked against Punta Muxi to the north, and the long Cea strand with the red stacks of Is Scoglius Arrubius standing twenty metres high, 300 metres offshore. The green promontory above the beach belongs to the same granite-and-porphyry geology that colours the whole of the Ogliastra littoral.