20th April Saturday
A glorious morning here in Puglia and breakfast out on the terrace in what can only be described as a perfect location - like a fine food - many different small parts all together in the right quantities bring together something truly beautiful and magical. From the rustic stonework and semi wild climbing plants to the sympathetically decorated breakfast restaurant, suitable for a 5 star retreat hotel. The staff are truly amazing - they care - your breakfast order is the most important thing in the world at that moment.
Today we headed roughly south to the heel of Italy near Taranto to Spiaggia Giannarelli which is a beautiful coastal beach going on for 10+ miles. We had the beach almost to ourselves for two hours and Liz enjoyed a good swim in the sea and then we finished the book we were reading together, The Cruel Sea (excellent BTW). The beach and sea were truly amazing, we can only imagine that later in the season it's busy, but now in mid-April it was deserted and a 20C sunny day was perfect for us Northern Europeans (Liz is bright red tonight!)
We continued our cross country drive through olive groves, vineyards and small towns to the other side of the Italian peninsula and a beautiful natural sea cave called the Cave of Poetry just south of Lecce. Looked perfect for swimming, and apparently the locals do, but it is not allowed, and today no one was in, so we didn't dare.
On the way back now we called in at Lecce and we'll soon be greeted by a fine for driving the wrong way down a one-way street (thanks Google Maps). Great plan Italy - don't sign the streets well in the old town, make it complex and put up CCTV to catch folks out. Finally we got out of the maze of narrow streets and found a parking spot for 20 minutes. Anyhow, we checked out central Lecce (the amphitheatre in particular) which was 'ok', and the church opposite. In fairness, after our navigation and parking issues the place wasn't going to get a fair hearing!
Home was an hour away and we decided to dine in at the 'posh restaurant' at the hotel for an early bite to eat. The bread basket at the restaurant comes in the theme of a gardeners work box and contains 3 types of olive oil from the farm - one of which was from trees exclusively over 1000 years old. Given that John mixes oil with balsamic vinegar the subtle differences between all three were somewhat lost! The food was lovely, the cocktail was welcome and, as the rest of the hotel, the restaurant was beautiful. There was a group of very noisy diners, but they provided some extra entertainment, along with the couple who must be loaded, as they were checking it over as a wedding venue...
21st April Sunday
After another nice breakfast, where the cat on John's knee stole a whole piece of bacon and scampered away, first we stopped in the local town, Pezze di Greco. We had researched that there was a service at the church, Saint Mary of the Carmel, at 10am. Another google lie so after 10 minutes reflection in the quiet church we carried on. We called in at Locorotondo, a small hill top town, to catch the views over the land and carpet of Trulli houses, and ended up joining a catholic mass at the main church in the town, dedicated bizarrely to St George, and with St George's day being in 2 days time, the service was kind of special and busy. We even snuck up for communion.
Alberobello is the town where the Trulli Zone is located: a UNESCO site. Although highly touristy it is quite amazing to see a whole town with this unique architecture, there must be over a 1000 Trulli houses and they are all well maintained. Many are B&Bs and of course many are tourist shops but it's still very atmospheric and truly (trulli!) unique. It's been on the bucket list for about 10 years since we first saw a photo of it in a pub in Warwickshire.
Back to the hotel where we just managed an hour on the terrace outside our room with the sun coming and going behind the clouds - it's still chilly for late April which is annoying but it is what it is.
Comments