Alghero Beyond the Walls: Necropolis, Coral Museum and Fertilia
Stone Age tombs, coral in a villa and a village that came from Istria
- Anghelu Ruju
- Guided visit €7, about 1 h
- Coral Museum
- €5
- Fertilia
- Free
Most visitors to Alghero spend the whole stay inside the walls or on the sand, which leaves three places outside the usual circuit. A necropolis cut into sandstone about five thousand years ago, a coral museum in an Art Nouveau villa and a village laid out in the 1930s each give a reason to stay one more day. None of them is a card on the main page, and only the necropolis needs a car.
Tombs cut into sandstone
The necropolis stands beside the SP 42 dei Due Mari and holds 38 tombs hollowed out of sandstone between 3200 and 2800 BC. They belong to the Ozieri culture, and they are the kind of rock-cut burial chamber that Sardinians call domus de janas. In July 2025 the site entered the UNESCO list as part of a series on the prehistoric funerary tradition of Sardinia, an island with around 3,500 of these chambers. The site is also far older than the nuraghi nearby, the Bronze Age towers of the kind you see at Palmavera.
You visit on a guided tour of about an hour, priced at €7. Hours depend on the month: 10:00 to 14:00 in January, March, November and December, 10:00 to 18:00 in April and October, and 10:00 to 19:00 in May and September. Public buses do not go there, so you arrive by car or on an organised tour. A two-hour tour combining the necropolis with the Palmavera nuraghe also exists. The Sella & Mosca winery stands on the same plateau and receives visitors by reservation. Its sparkling Oscarì is made from Torbato, the local white grape. Book ahead.
3-star hotel, double room, per person per night
The Coral Museum in Villa Costantino
Red coral gave the local coast its name, the Riviera del Corallo, and it ranks among the finest in the Mediterranean. The museum that explains it sits in Villa Costantino, an Art Nouveau house from the early 1900s. Entry is €5, and a visit takes about an hour. It opens on Mondays and Wednesdays from 16:30 to 19:00 and on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10:30 to 13:00. From Friday to Sunday it opens in both slots, so the afternoon is the safer choice if you wander in without a plan.
A village the state built
The airport bus passes through Fertilia on its way into town, which means most visitors cross the village without getting off. It was laid out in the 1930s and settled by colonists from Ferrara, and its streets carry the names of places in the Veneto and in the Julian March. After 1947 it took in many refugees from Istria, Rijeka and Dalmatia, so a second layer of memory sits on top of the first. Settlement from outside is an old pattern here, since Catalan families arrived in 1354, and Fertilia is the most recent chapter.
A lion of Saint Mark, the emblem of Venice, watches the sea from the viewpoint. The story has not ended, because in May 2026 Trieste named a boatyard Squero Fertilia, in tribute to the exiles who settled here. Entry costs nothing. The bus makes this the easiest of the three to add to a day, and the lion is the reason to stop. Walk down to the viewpoint for the lion, then follow the streets one by one and read the names, which turn a quiet grid of houses into a short lesson in the geography of north-eastern Italy.
Where to next
Nomadinho scores out of 100, the same ones behind “Where to go”.
If you like Alghero
Three places with the closest scores, from any country.
Before you go
Short answers to what people ask most before setting out.
Can you get to Anghelu Ruju without a car?
Not reliably. The site has no public bus, so the choice is a car or an organised tour. By car you follow the SP 42 dei Due Mari, and the winery is on the same plateau. A guided visit takes about an hour and costs €7.
What is a domus de janas?
It is a burial chamber cut into the rock, the typical tomb of prehistoric Sardinia. Anghelu Ruju has 38 of them, dated to 3200 to 2800 BC, and the UNESCO series that includes the site was inscribed on 12 July 2025.
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