Beyond the Costa Smeralda

When I revealed that for our silver wedding anniversary I was whisking my wife off to Sardinia, some friends jokingly queried whether I'd just won the lottery. Understandably so, because the island is best known for its Costa Smeralda — a small strip of indented coastline selected by the Aga Khan as a playground for the über-wealthy.

Back in the Seventies, when the first luxury villas and hotels went up, the target clientele was known as the "jet set". Now they're celebs, Eurobrats and Gulf Arabs. This August the Costa Smeralda hosted, among others, Leonardo DiCaprio, Naomi Campbell (fresh off the witness stand) and her Russian billionaire consort, Vladimir Doronin.

Fitting, then, that a supermodel "inconvenienced" by having to appear at the Blood Diamonds trial in The Hague should migrate seamlessly to party on Sardinia's Emerald Coast, which during August offers all of the serious fashionista's holiday accessories.

The principal marina at Porto Cervo is clogged with "mine's-bigger-than-yours" super-yachts, under-utilised Lamborghinis and seasonally open designer boutiques where, if you do pick up a gemstone, it will be cut, polished and in a box.

Since all of this is financially out of my league, and yet still wanting to make a special event of it, I decided to forsake the Costa Smeralda's unquestioned natural beauties and focused instead on the other 98 per cent of what is, after all, the second largest island in the Mediterranean (Sicily is the biggest). Outside of the billionaires' enclave prices return to the Italian norm, and once August is over room rates drop dramatically.

Being married to a professional foodie, for our anniversary I booked into Su Gologone — a rustic hotel in the heartlands of the Barbagia region famed for its traditional cooking. Surrounded by gardens and vineyards, with clear views across the valley to Supramonte (possibly the most dramatic mountain on an island where rugged grandeur is the norm), the place has a quirky, post-hippyish charm with works by contemporary artists and collections of folk art — stag's head masks, embroidery and ceramics — lurking in its labyrinthine corridors or scattered across its many gardens.

That evening I dined on mountain hams, smoked salami and lardo accompanied by estate-grown olives and pane carasau — the crisp flatbread of Sardinia — followed by angiulotts, local raviolis stuffed with ricotta, before moving on to roast suckling pig. As arrosti are the house speciality, my wife went for the lighter option of roast kid. From an impressive wine list I chose a 13-year-old Cannonau, the staunchest of Sardinia's many native varietals. It matched the food perfectly.

Fortunately, there were plenty of ways to work that kind of diet off: a visit to the natural spring of Su Gologone, whose waters pour forth from an underground lake so deep that not even specialist divers have ever reached the bottom; a few lengths in the spring-fed pool followed by some gentle pummelling in the open-air Jacuzzi down by the wellness centre (I missed out on the "myrtle massage"); early morning walks and horse-trekking along Sopramonte's lower slopes; and expeditions to discover the haunting remains of the Nuraghic civilisation that flourished here more than 3,000 years ago.

Nuraghic tombs, towers and villages are to be found all over Sardinia but some of the best are nearby. Hidden within its mountain-top crater is the village of Tiscali, whose name was adopted by the Sardinian founder of a well-known internet service provider. Better preserved is Serra Orrios, and more impressively mysterious is the giant's tomb of Sa Ena'e Thomes, with its granite finger pointing to the sky.

But for me, the most romantic of these ruins is Nurraghe Mannu, standing high on a sea-cliff that commands a view over the dramatic Gulf of Orosei. We stopped there on the way back from Cala Gonone, an erstwhile fishing port turned seaside resort from where you take a short boat ride to what is possibly Sardinia's most spectacular beach.