Archive for the ‘Alghero’ Category
Alghero is an Historical Town
Alghero is probably Sardinia’s most touristy town and its most attractive:
WIth it’s colourful bell towers and cobbled streets , its medieval walls and seaside bastions . Yet Alghero started as a Catalan colony and you can still see the Catalan-inscribed street signs of “Little Barcelona”, and eat paella.
One of Alghero’s landmarks is the Cattedrale di Santa Maria in the Piazza Duomo - a mixture of Renaissance, Baroque and Gothic styles with four oversized Doric columns that nearly cover its façade. The campanile and portal are from the original 1552 construction and modelled after the cathedral in Barcelona.
Nearby in the Museo Diocesano d’Arte Sacra you can view Spanish jewels, a marble statue of the Madonna della Misericordia, and a collection of stamped lithographs of Sardinian Romanesque churches.
Hertz Car Hire Alghero
Hertz have a car rental desk at Alghero Airport - one of many at the airport.
Hertz car hire prices may not always be the cheapest - but they do seem to have a good selection of cars.
Expect to be offered Italian made cars such as Fiat - make sure you get air conditioning otherwise you will bake in the 34 degree summer temperatures.
Hertz Car Hire Alghero Airport
Car hire in Italian is Autonoleggio
Some Restaurant Recommendations in Alghero
San Perbacco Cafe - on waterfront overlooking the harbor - pasta mainly €25 euro for 2 with a glass of wine and water.
Cafe Constantino - on Piazza Civica I think - very elegant, does piato completo eg. calmari or pork/fries/salad for 10 euro. Good for lunch or a light supper.
El Putal - catalan style - good pizza and veal, 32 for two with wine and water.
Ristorante Cassablanca - In the old town € 25 for 2 courses, wine and water. In old olive store, very interesting with vaulted cielings.
Trattoria Appena Prima - has an inside and outside with different menus and prices (neither cheap) excellent food - seafood salad, steak, veg, dessert, wine and water €70 for 2.
Miques di Mirall - right on the sea wall looking over towards the grotto. Excellent seafood Fritto misto and seafood Fantasia with wine and water €57.50 for 2 at lunch.
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New Beach Shuttle Bus in Alghero
From Monday June 15 a new shuttle bus service has been launched in Alghero - connecting the city with the main beaches.
The service will run from 9 to 13:30 and from 16 to 00.30, every day, including Sundays.
The route is Via Garibaldi, Piazza Sulis, along the sea Dante; Valencia beach; Viale della Resistenza, Via Villanova Monteleone, Via Giovanni XXIII, Via XX Settembre, Via Lo Frasso, Via Mallorca, Via Garibaldi, Via Lido, Viale I May; Fertilia (optional detour to the golf driving range).
For more details call to the tourist office in Via Carlo Alberto, (with multilingual staff: English, Spanish, German, Catalan, Portuguese, French, Russian and Polish). The office will be open daily, including Sundays, until 23.30.
Cheapest Car Hire at Alghero Airport
With all the extra flights into Alghero this summer - tourists are being advised to make sure they have their car hire booked in advance. One website was talking about a shortage of cars for hire in summer 2009 because of all the new routes opened up by Ryanair.
We did a quick check of Alghero car hire prices booked online for a week in August 2009. The comparisons were done on May 23rd 2009 for 7 days car rental from August 8th to August 15th 2009
Auto Europe were offering a 2 door Fiat Panda with Air con for £180.12 for 7 days.
Holiday Autos quoted me £193 Pounds for an Opel Corsa for the same 7 days.
£205.01 Pounds at Hertz Car Hire would get me a Fiat Panda 2 door for the week. (Paid in Full in advance)
Europcar had a Fiat Panda 4 door for the price of €245.30 Euro (about £279 GBP) almost 100 pounds more than the cheapest quote I obtained.
The prices above were the lowest priced cars on offer from each company at Alghero Airport on the day I was quoted. Prices will change by the day and availability too. Book early to avoid getting a car you don’t want or a more expensive price.
For people who want to spend a bit more or need a bigger car for the family - the following cars were also available.
Holiday Autos had a VW Caravelle 9 seater minibus for £567 Pounds
£411 pounds would get you a mini cooper convertible from Auto Europe
Easter Tourist Figures good for Alghero
All the signs are good for the tourism business - with this first taste of summer. Restaurants, hotels, car rentals, shopping, all starting to smile again at least for a few days - while awaiting the warmer months. The only negative note was the protracted closure of the Caves of Neptune, because of restoration work not completed despite ads reopening for Easter.
Ancona Flights to Alghero
Ryanair are introducing a twice weekly flight (Fri & Mon) flight from Ancona to Alghero from early June and there are the usual reasonably priced introductory fares. Great idea for a short break in the sun.
Ryanair starting flights from Memmingen to Alghero
Ryanair will open a new route to Alghero in Sardinia from Memmingen (approx 75kms west of Munich) . Flights begin in starting May 2009
Ryanair celebrated their new Memmingen (Munich West) Airport, seven new routes and 500,000 passengers by knocking 50% off its 1million lowest fares for travel across its European network in April, May and June which are available for booking from midnight tonight on the airlines website.
Ryanair setting up new base in Alghero
Ryanair is building up it’s Italian market and trying to take advantage of the poor state of Alitalia.
It said it was planning to open two new bases on Sardinia at Alghero and Cagliari, in March 2009. The two bases will create eight new domestic and 11 new international routes to and from the island.
Ryanaie- Europe’s biggest low-cost carrier - also said it was also increasing its services between Rome Ciampino and the Milan region to five a day from late next month and was adding a new twice-daily domestic service between Rome and Trapani in Sicily in December.
Alghero and Cagliari will become the group’s sixth and seventh bases in Italy with locally based aircraft in addition to Rome, MilanBergamo, Pisa, Bologna and Forli.
It said it would base one 189-seat Boeing737-800 in Alghero and would operate a total of 18 routes to and from the north Sardinian city with two aircraft based at the Cagliari base offering 19 routes initially.