Boat tours to La Maddalena from other towns: where to sail from and which trip to book

Boat tours to La Maddalena from other towns do not all leave from Palau. Santa Teresa Gallura, Cannigione and Baia Sardinia have their own direct sailings, Olbia has one trip with a minibus transfer included, and anyone sleeping in Porto Cervo, San Teodoro or Alghero has some arithmetic to do with kilometres and clock times. The rule is simple: the closer your base sits to the Bocche di Bonifacio (the Strait of Bonifacio), the more you can do without a car.

Below is the picture town by town, with distances from Palau, whether direct boats exist, the trip we would book from each base and a link to the detailed page.

How the departures work, base by base

The archipelago lies straight out from Palau, two nautical miles from the island of La Maddalena. Every group boat works out of one of three basins. Palau is the nearest and most sheltered harbour. Santa Teresa Gallura sits 25 km west at the mouth of the channel, so its boats cross a stretch of open water. Third comes the Golfo di Arzachena (the Gulf of Arzachena), with Cannigione, Laconia and Baia Sardinia, where big motor ships run up the coast towards Caprera.

Everything else, from Olbia southwards, feeds into one of those three harbours by car, by bus or on an organised pickup. For the full range of boats at the main harbour, which is still the benchmark, read our guide to boat trips from Palau.

Where to sail from: the table

Distances are approximate and pickup points change from season to season: the tour listing is what counts.

Santa Teresa Gallura

This is the only base besides Palau with daily departures in several formats. The harbour sits at the mouth of the channel, so every trip opens with the crossing of the Bocche di Bonifacio towards Razzoli and Budelli, then the usual stops: the natural pools, Santa Maria, Spargi, Spiaggia Rosa (the Pink Beach) seen from the water and, on many boats, free time in La Maddalena town.

The trips listed on GetYourGuide at the time of writing:

• Full day on a motor ship: leaves at 9 am, lunch on board, back around 5 pm; 4.3 out of 5 from 1,452 reviews. The listing states a €5 per person landing fee, paid in cash at check-in for the municipality of La Maddalena.
• Catamaran: lunch, wine and the natural pools off Budelli; 4.6 from 612 reviews.
• Budget motor ship: La Maddalena, Santa Maria, Budelli, Spargi; 4.1 from 227 reviews.
• Sailing boat with Escursì: 4.9 from 49 reviews, small group.
• RIB: a full day in an inflatable, 4.2 from a handful of reviews.

The catch is the sea. In a westerly the leg out to Razzoli is the roughest water in the archipelago. If you get seasick, take a tablet before boarding or pick Palau instead. Our page on boat trips from Santa Teresa Gallura goes through all of it.

Insider tip: on the Santa Teresa boats, sit aft and amidships for the crossing. That is the spot that moves least. The bow deck, where everyone goes to photograph Corsica, is the part that slams.

Cannigione and the Gulf of Arzachena

Cannigione is a village on the Golfo di Arzachena about 15 km from Palau, and it has the quay for the big motor ships: boats carrying many dozens of passengers, a plate of pasta on board, two or three swim stops and often free time in La Maddalena town. These are the trips that also collect guests from the Costa Smeralda resorts, with a coach pickup in some cases.

• Caprera, Spargi, Budelli and Santa Maria: the best rated in the gulf, 4.9 from 499 reviews, and one of the few tours to include a stop at Caprera. Check availability and price on the listing.
• Full-day cruise: 7 hours, two swim stops and free time in La Maddalena; 4.4 from 2,314 reviews. Check the dates on the listing.
• Northern Sardinia boat trip: a full day with lunch, 4.4 from 1,298 reviews.

The route from Cannigione hugs the eastern flank of Caprera and comes into the archipelago from the south, so you see Cala Coticcio and the eastern coves that the Palau boats never touch. The drawback is boat size: these ships anchor well off the coves and reach the natural pools in the busiest part of the day. Our page on boat trips from Cannigione compares the three motor ships.

Baia Sardinia

A beach resort a few minutes from Cannigione. It has no motor-ship quay of its own, but the local archipelago trip lists departures from Laconia, Cannigione and Baia Sardinia depending on the day, with a Spargi, Budelli and Santa Maria route and a Caprera variant on Saturdays and Sundays; 4.4 from 324 reviews on GetYourGuide. If you are staying here, check on the listing which pier applies to your date before you book, because the difference is a few kilometres of driving. More on our page about boat trips from Baia Sardinia.

Porto Cervo and the Costa Smeralda

Porto Cervo, the capital of the Costa Smeralda, is roughly 30 km from Palau. Group tours to the archipelago do not sail from its marina: guests staying here choose between Cannigione (the nearest), Palau, or a private charter. One trip does run the other way round, though. The hybrid eco trip is a five-hour boat out of Palau with an aperitivo (drinks and snacks before dinner) that comes down from La Maddalena as far as Porto Cervo; GetYourGuide lists it from €119 with 4.8 out of 5 from 35 reviews.

For a classic day among the islands from a Costa Smeralda base, the practical answer is still a 15 to 20 minute drive to Cannigione and one of the motor ships, or Palau if you want more choice. We cover it on the page about boat trips from Porto Cervo.

Olbia: airport, ferries and the minibus tour

Olbia is the way into Gallura: the Costa Smeralda airport and the ferry port for Livorno, Civitavecchia, Genoa and Piombino. Olbia Costa Smeralda also has summer flights from several UK airports, which is why the Olbia to La Maddalena question comes up so often in June and September. Palau is about 40 km away, 45 minutes by car; ARST buses cover the same route in roughly 1 h 15 to 1 h 30. The awkward part is doing it without a car, because bus plus tour works only if the timetables line up perfectly.

That is why the most booked trip from Olbia is the combined coach and boat day: a minibus pickup in town, transfer to the boat at Cannigione, then a day taking in La Maddalena, Spargi and Santa Maria with pasta lunch on board, nine hours in all; 4.5 out of 5 from 508 reviews on GetYourGuide at the time of writing. Check the pickup points and availability on the listing, because the stops change every season.

With a car you have the whole Palau fleet instead, and you can pick your boat according to the day’s wind. The full rundown is on our page about boat trips from Olbia.

Insider tip: if you land at Olbia in the morning, do not book the tour for the same day. Between the hire car desk, the drive and parking in Palau, you risk watching the boat leave without you. Keep the tour for day two and spend the first afternoon at Roccia dell’Orso (Bear Rock) or on the ferry across to La Maddalena.

Alghero: drive, or switch to Santa Teresa

Alghero sits on the west coast, about 170 km and two and a half hours by car from Palau. No daily direct boat tours run from Alghero to the archipelago, because the sea distance is simply too great. Local agencies sometimes sell coach-and-boat packages, but the substance never changes: you end up at Palau or Santa Teresa Gallura and board a boat that leaves from there.

In your own car the day is long but perfectly doable: away at first light, a 7–8 hour tour, back for dinner. Santa Teresa is marginally closer to Alghero than Palau, which is why many people pick the trips from there. Our page on boat trips from Alghero to La Maddalena explains how to build the day and when a night in Gallura is the better call.

San Teodoro and Cagliari, briefly

San Teodoro lies about 35 km south of Olbia; allow roughly an hour and a quarter from there to Palau. Two options: drive to Palau and choose your boat on the spot, or get to Olbia and join the tour with the minibus transfer, checking on the listing whether the pickup covers your area. From Cagliari, some 300 km away, a day trip makes no sense at all. It is worth doing only with at least one night in Gallura.

Choosing the right base

• Staying in Santa Teresa: book from there, but keep Palau as a plan B on days with a westerly.
• Staying on the Gulf of Arzachena or the Costa Smeralda: Cannigione for convenience, Palau for the small boats and the catamarans.
• In Olbia without a car: the minibus tour, or an early ARST bus to Palau.
• In Alghero, San Teodoro or further south: drive to Palau or Santa Teresa and, if you can, sleep a night in Gallura.
• In every case: the GetYourGuide listings quoted here offer free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead, and when the mistral blows hard the operator cancels with a refund or a new date. Book early for July and August, when the cheapest boats sell out one to two weeks in advance.

Insider tip: whichever base you sail from, pack small notes. Several boats ask at check-in for a modest landing contribution for the park or for the municipality of La Maddalena, and not all of them take cards. The “Not included” section of the listing tells you whether there is one and how much.

The short version

Boat tours to La Maddalena from other towns come in three shapes: a direct boat from Santa Teresa Gallura, Cannigione or Baia Sardinia; the minibus trip out of Olbia; and a drive to Palau from everywhere else in Sardinia. If you land at Olbia without a car, the simplest answer is the tour that pairs a pickup with a boat from Cannigione, so check availability and price for the trip from Olbia on GetYourGuide. To compare every format, from motor ship to catamaran, start with our guide to the La Maddalena archipelago tour.