Saline Conti Vecchi

Visit Santa Gilla salt village

The lagoons of Cagliari form an extensive and delicate ecosystem, inhabited since ancient time. Nowdaysthe wetland around the city represent areas of outstanding  natural importance.
The Saline Conti Vecchi, are an example of how Sardinia, in the past, has experienced periods of great social emancipation and an economic and industrial development.
This project was from the engineer Luigi Conti Vecchi.
The project of the salt pans was welcomed by the whole community and in a few years it became a very large eco-sustainable and avant – garde production plant.

The “salt village” was equipped with schools, churches, houses and special facilities to accommodate the families of factory employees and managers.A real microcosm was created, a virtuous example of a flourishing industrial reality that grew up in a depressed area of the island.

Today the industrial site still belongs to the Conti Vecchi society, but is controlled by Syndial, a company that deals with environmental rehabilitation. The Syndial, together with FAI (Italian Environment Fund), work in close collaboration for the enhancement of the saltworks and its transformation in a resource to show to the public. A splendid industrial architecture of the 1930s, meticulously restored. An educ-actor tells us of a past that no longer exists and the Mistery of Lagoon. 

                                                     

Laboratory

The nature trail, is completed with an interesting ride on the train: with the tourist guide, we explored the paths of the Natural Park area and the pond of Santa Gilla, where, still today, reigns a delicate balance of rare beauty with more than 35 thousand species of waterfowl including pink flamingos.
Before arriving at the wildlife area, both from the one and the other side, we have seen the countless salt tanks and the impressive salt hills.