Serpentara

Four kilometres off Villasimius, the granite spine of Serpentara rises from the sea like its namesake snake. Uninhabited and wind-scoured, it marks the far end of the Capo Carbonara marine park, with a Spanish-era watchtower still standing on its highest ridge and seabirds nesting on its slopes.

Why it matters

Serpentara belongs to the territory of Villasimius and closes the arc of the Capo Carbonara marine protected area, which the regional tourism portal describes as running from Capo Boi out to the island. Serpentara is the second of the protected area’s two main islands after Isola dei Cavoli, which lies to the east at its northern end. The reserve’s islands host rare and endemic species, and its perimeter overlaps a Site of Community Importance.

Uninhabited and without permanent development, the island’s granite has been sculpted by wind and sea.

What to notice

The name may refer to the island’s elongated, sinuous shape or to the endemic erba serpentaria, Helicodiceros muscivorus, whose spotted spathe resembles a reptile.

On the northern side the great granite boulders called the Variglioni form natural pools clear enough to swim in on calm days. The southern shore is a different geology lesson: masses of granite stained yellow, grey and pink by wind and salt. At the summit, about fifty metres above the sea, stands the Torre di San Luigi, built under Spanish rule to sight Saracen ships raiding the Sarrabus coast; from the top the whole southeastern coastline is in view.

The island is a nesting site for the European shag, the yellow-legged gull and the rare Audouin's gull, along with shearwaters; the surrounding waters also host dolphins.

Context and history

The watchtower belongs to the same Spanish coastal defensive system as the towers of the nearby mainland coast: chains of sighting points that signalled one another with lights and flags against Barbary raids, a network the Soprintendenza documents for this stretch of Sardinia from the late sixteenth century. Serpentara's Torre di San Luigi was its seaward outpost, watching the approaches to the Sarrabus.

Modern protection arrived by sea law rather than fortress law. The Capo Carbonara marine protected area was established by ministerial decree on 15 September 1998 and reorganized by the decree of 7 February 2012, with management entrusted solely to the Comune di Villasimius; the area almost entirely overlaps a Site of Community Importance under the Habitats Directive, holds Special Protection Zones under the Birds Directive, and is listed as a Special Protected Area of Mediterranean Importance under the Barcelona Convention. Activities at sea — boating, fishing, diving, anchoring — are regulated zone by zone, and the islands sit inside that framework.