Puglia, the heel of the boot

I think this is my favorite part of Italy, so far. The people were friendly and encouraged us to practice Italian, no matter how much we struggled. The food is fantastic! As John said, you have to try hard to eat badly around here. The land is a sea of olive groves, some of the trunks of the trees are so huge we just knew they must be hundreds of years old. Everywhere we turned there was another view of the sea, or of fields and houses that we wanted to keep forever.

Matera, looking across the ravine from our "cave" door. The picture does not really capture the feeling of the place, many movies have been filmed here including the Mel Gibson "Passion of Christ".

John, enjoying cave luxury. Notice the blend of modern & traditional. To his left, out of sight, is an old armoire with a beautiful bevelled mirror mounted on the door.

We stayed in a town called Matera, where the attraction is the cave houses. In the long ago days people lived in these caves to escape the heat of the summer and to keep warm in the winter. In modern times many of the caves have been converted into hotels and restaurants. The town is picturesque and lively and simply a fun place to be....we splashed out the cash to spend one night in a cave. Such a cave! It was decorated with typical Italian style, modern furniture and antiques mixed together, just enough of everything to make it perfect. (And the breakfast was good too!).

John & Nelson explore the Trulli Village.

After Matera we made a stop in Alberobello, where the attraction is the Trulli houses. They are cone shaped piles of rocks that are whitewashed inside and out, there's an opening at the top to let out the smoke and ....well that's about it. We saw them in the fields and farmyards all around the city and they are used as homes, wineries, hotels, restaurants, whatever you can think of. Apparently it's the only place in the world where houses like this are built. I'll have to take the guide book word on that!

Our last stop in Puglia was Ostuni, which is a pretty town of white-washed houses on a hill above the Adriatic Sea. We are very familiar with the town square, and the restaurants that serve gellato (italian ice cream) and granitas (something like a slushy with crushed ice but ohohoh so much better with fresh lemon juice) because we arrived in town at 2 in the afternoon and everything was SHUT. Siesta time, you'd think we would be used to it by now. The problem was the B&B we had a reservation at did not appear on our GPS and we needed directions from the tourist office. The tourist office was closed between one and five in the afternoon. So, Nelson went for a wander looking for free wireless connection (the internet cafe was also closed) while J and I relaxed in the town square. The tourist office finally opened, and we finally found our B&B, and since it took so much trouble to find we stayed for an extra night! Well, they had a pool, and we needed to make forward plans for our return across Europe and home. It was hard to leave the magic land of Puglia, but knowing we have not seen it all gives us a good reason to come back.