Bari to Lecce

Lecce, Italy October 3, 2022 Saturday in Bari was a do nothing day. Tim figured out how to take the train to the Bari airport the next day to pick up a rental car. Lynda worked on packing and R and R, resting and reading. She probably did more of the latter. We did go out in the evening for dinner. It was a beautiful night and the locals were out in force. In Italy, evening meals in restaurants don't usually begin until 7:30 at the earliest and 9:00 is more common. As always people watching was great fun. Fashion is so different for both men and women. We left Bari about 11:30 Sunday morning. Our plan was to drive through Alberobello. Alberobello is home to a World Heritage Site of truilli, a 14th century construction. Truilli are rectangular huts made of limestone with conical limestone roofs. There are over 1500 of these in the Alberobello region. They are very striking to see. Most now are used as homes but we saw many less elaborately constructed truilli in the fields. Many are used as tourist accomodations. Getting to our AirBnB in Lecce turned out to be an adventure. Lynda was giving Tim directions. Her directions finished with "find a place to park, we have to walk from here". Our apartment is in a neighborhood of centuries old buildings. Our host told us our building was 4 hundred years old. This is in stark contrast to our apartment in Bari that was in a post WW II building and very contempary in design. We would have not located our Lecce apartment without Google maps. While it has been modernized with up to date kitchen features and bathroom facilities, there is enough of the original to make it very interesting. Our host told Tim he needed to move the car to a nearby street where parking was free for as long as you like. As Tim's cell phone was low on charge he did not take it with him and got terribly lost trying to get back to the car. Our neighborhood is a warren of little streets where one wrong turn can get you terribly lost. Tim took 45 minutes to finally find the car. He spent 15-20 minutes looking for a parking space without any luck and ending up back where we originally parked. He got lost again trying to find the neighborhood. Tim slept well Sunday night. Today, Monday, we ventured out to visit churches. Lecce became infatuated with the Baroque style of architecture in the 16th century to the point of remodeling existing churches in that style. This resulted in Lecce being known as the "Baroque city of Italy". We visited three of the most famous of the Lecce churches, the Duomo, the Basilica of Santa Croce, and the Chiesa di Santa Chiara. All were different but equally striking in the ornate Baroque style. The Basilica of Santa Croce was hosting a wedding in the afternoon but we decided that crashing one wedding on this trip was enough. We returned to our apartment for nap time and then went out for a lovely evening meal. Tuesday we took a day trip to Ortanto at the very heel of the boot on the Mediterranean Sea. It was a beautiful cloudless day but with a cool, fresh wind. The sea was reasonably rough and a gorgeous blue. The waves crashing against the rocks were exciting. As is Lynda's want, we took two different routes going and coming back. In both directions we passed kilometer after kilometer of olive tree groves. It was fascinating to see some groves with very old but still healthy trees as opposed to some that were old but well cared for. We also saw several places where new trees had been planted. The harvest typically runs from October to December. There are many factors that affect the time of harvest, too many to enumerate. We saw no signs of the harvest being under way yet. No trip anywhere is complete until we visit a cemetary. Our trip is complete. Fortunately, it was an interesting one. There were only several sections what we would consider traditional gravesites. The rest were family mausoleums. Many of these mausoleums were very contemporary in design. Most were for individual families. We saw one that contained the remains of a 24 year, obviously leaving lots of space for the rest of the family. Tonight we are snacking in our apartment and then later, after dark, will go out and join the passeggiata and stop for a gelato. Passeggiata is an evening stroll that lots of people join. In a city like Lecce everyone strolls on the main street that is pretty much a pedestrian zone. If the weather is as good as last night it will be a wonderful paseggiata.

Lecce Duomo

The Roman Amphitheatre in Lecce

Our kitchen ceiling in Lecce

Our apartment in Lecce