The Adriatic coast. Rugged white cliffs and headlands with ancient towns and cities rising out of sheltered harbors buzzing with fishing boats. You can feel the Homeric poems recounting epic adventures of heroic Corinthians. The towns are still alive with the residents going about their days as they have for centuries ( ... just overlook the ubiquitous smart phones).
The Gulf of Taranto. Arid plains that transition to sometimes sandy but otherwise rocky beaches. Shuttered beach holiday resorts with peeling plaster and rusting verandas. Nondescript resort towns with shops selling every type of bric-a-brac and dive bars full of guys named Fabio, who you just know that if it wasn't November, would be sporting a banana-hammock, and nothing else, as they quaffed their not-made-in-nature orange colored Aperol spritz.
I may just be overplaying this a bit, but after today, and our brief stay on the east coast in Monopoli last week, the Adriatic coast of Salento is stunning. This is Pulgia from the postcards. This is simply great.
The west coast was nice, and the places we stayed and the people at them were absolutely first rate. However the weather did not conspire to show these places in their best light and we also have to remember that it's our fault for going to the beach in mid November. Even so, the raw material in the east just gives so much more to work with.
From the moment we started pedaling north from Leuca along the east coast of the Salento peninsula, it was just one wow moment after another. It helped that we had a pretty good tailwind. It also helped that it was 20 C and mostly sunny. It helped immensely that there was essentially NO traffic.
It is still very quiet and we are the only tourists around. However the towns and villages have a life outside the tourist trade that gives sustaining lifeblood to them. Don't be mistaken, tourism is the main business here too, but there's enough other stuff going on that if you arrive 'out of season' you are not encountering ghost towns.
Lots of pics from today. It's hard to pare them down to the essentials and we were only cycling for just a bit over two hours! We are spending the day in Otranto tomorrow before our last day of cycling into Lecce on Sunday. First impressions of Otranto is that it is beautiful. Stunning harbor and compact old town.
We have a great B&B with tremendous hosts so we are really looking forward to crawling through this place tomorrow.
Song of the Day, Con te Partiro by Andrea Bocelli ... live in Piazza dei Cavelieri in Pisa. A beautiful song by an Italian legend that just captures Italy. It could have been any of the beautiful piazza's and romantic narrow streets in many of the towns throughout this country. Wandering the nearly empty streets and waterfront plazas of Otranto in the evening was magical, and hearing this when we returned to our B&B wrapped a bow around the feeling. 'With You I Will Leave' ...yes, we will be leaving soon. It has not all been rainbows and unicorns, but there have been more days like this than wind-and-rain-eating-sausages-at-the-side-of-the-road days. And for that, we are thankful.
Now sitting at home and putting together a youtube playlist, technology interfaces have raised their head. The original live video of Andrea by himself won't play in Canada. I've replaced it by probably the more famous version he did with Sarah Brightman, still live, still in Italy, and still great.
The sign is not quite right ... this is our penultimate day of biking ... setting off from Leuca for another big one ... 50 km's north along the coast with a tailwind!
Our first hill right out of Leuca. Very nice ride along the more rugged east coast of Salento. Each town had its own climb out and descent in. Made for interesting, in the best way, biking
... As K rounded that last curve we came into a small rocky valley where a farmer was moving his herd of sheep and goats ... you can just make him out on the far right
a few random shots from around Otranto ... more to come tomorrow. We did a quick run through the Cathedral ... amazing mosaic floor among other things, and we'll get that tomorrow ... but I like this shot ... looks like the clergy have a sense of humour!
Every bar serves simple snacks such as peanuts, olives and taralli, crunchy little buscuits that we have taken to calling ‘dog biscuits ‘ ... what really set l’Ortale apart was their very cute presentation .... in what looked to me like sardine and tuna tins
Scott AndersonI really enjoyed this post. Like Rachael, I really love this area too, and especially Otranto. I’m mostly glad to see your impressions of it in the off-season though. I think Puglia could be a great midwinter destination, as long as you went with realistic expectations and based yourself in ‘real’ towns that still have life after the tourists go home. Reply to this comment 5 years ago
