ASINARA ISLAND – First a ‘quarantine’ station, then a prisoner of war camp during the First World War and lastly a maximum-security prison, with its rich nature, it has been a part of the national park of the same name since 1997 and it is separated from the beach of Pelosa (Sardinia) and the Isola Piana island by the Passaggio dei Fornelli, a deep blue navigable canal.
Asinara consists in five thousand hectares of protected area and the Asinara donkey is its identifying symbol. It is possible to meet there it almost everywhere during the visit, mouflons, wild boars, horses and birds, including the Audouin’s gull, the European shag, the peregrine falcon and the magpie. High promontories, beaches of soft sand and crystal clear water, among which several coves, including Cala dei Ponzesi, Cala Sabina and Cala Sant’Andrea, protect the lush flora: 678 species, of which 29 are native ones.
The sea of Asinara is a real treasure chest. In 2002, the marine protected area was established to protect biodiversity and the micro and macro underwater environments. A paradise in which is possible to observe the seabeds made up of sinuous recesses, gullies and clefts, in which there are also shipwrecks, one of which is opposite the pier of Cala Reale. To the west, the coast plunges dramatically with sea stacks covered in seaweed and brightly colored wildlife, while to the east it slopes gently, with sand and rocks. The coastline has been colonized by rare species, like Red algae and the ribbed Mediterranean limpet, while a little further out you might have surprising encounters with dolphins ( https://www.parcoasinara.org)

“In the northernmost tip of Sardinia, in the centre of the western Mediterranean, is an elongated, arch-shaped island of about 52 square kilometres, with 110 km of coast: the Island of Asinara. At its widest point, Asinara is 6.5 km wide, and only 287 metres at its narrowest point. A combination of historical, cultural, natural and landscape features makes this a fascinating area. Difficult to reach due to its geographical isolation and devoid of the presence of a community since 1885, when a penal colony and a quarantine location were established on the island, Asinara has been a National Park and a Marine Protected Area since 1997. Today, it is home to precious endemic species: thousands of animals living in contact with spontaneous vegetation that has adapted to the difficult environmental conditions. The island’s ancient asymmetrical coastlines tell us about tectonic tensions from over 500 million years ago, while hundreds of buildings and ruins bear witness to past eras from the Neolithic period onwards against a backdrop of uncontaminated beaches and biodiversity hotspots. Over the last 136 years, Asinara has been an open-air workhouse, a prison, a leper hospital, a concentration camp and a place of confinement during fascism. But it has also been a place where destinies have crossed, an island of nature and freedom, where land and sea meet in the Asinara Gulf. This island is a kaleidoscope of stories of communities that were suddenly removed from their territory time and time again, of dramatic experiences lived by people from all over Italy during its years as a prison, of different ethnicities who arrived from all over Europe during WWI, in a precarious balance between life and death. It also tells the story of Ethiopian internees deported after the 1937 bombing of Addis Ababa, of brave, pioneering prison directors who sought to improve quality of life on the island, of the industriousness of the inmates and their daily work to redeem themselves from the mistakes made in civil society, of the current liveliness of the Park’s operators, students and visitors. The island is a closed space where these experiences overlap, interweave and interact with each other to create surprising, profound and moving images. This unusual concentration of biodiversity and history makes the Island of Asinara an incredible attraction. With the creation of the Park, it is now able to offer increasingly well-organised visits, and improved coexistence between governing institutions and the economic operators that represent the new resilient resident community means citizens and visitors are increasingly involved in scientific, educational and recreational activities, opening up the island to new artistic experimentation and influences.” Vittorio Gazale, Director of the National Park