Travelling south from Polignano we entered the Salento region of Puglia - headed for its crowning jewel, Lecce. Also known as the Florence of the south, the old town is full of beautiful honey-hued baroque buildings, decorated to the excess. This OTT style is unique to Lecce, and is known as Leccese Baroque. The Latin phrase horror vacui, meaning “fear of empty spaces” was a guiding design principle. The architects also designed the building facades with unique ratios, to draw the eyes in. The more we looked the more we saw, and the more we liked this old town.
Lecce is in the heel of Italy and inconvenient to get to if you’re on a quick trip. This means there are less tourists here, and they/we are yet to destroy the authentic Italian feel of the place. The local university brings the average age down considerably, and we didn’t feel as though we’d disembarked alongside a senior citizen cruise ship. Alongside the typical cafes, there were bars playing alt rock and grunge, baggy jeans and oversize tee’s were aplenty and multiple businesses proudly hung pride flags outside (queer culture is mostly invisible in Italy). Things weren’t always so vibrant in Lecce, the old city was in ruins, invaded by vegetation, covered in asphalt and all but abandoned till the 1990’s. Slowly with the arrival of the university, many regeneration projects and no doubt some considerable coin, the old town was brought back to life.
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We are now well synced to the slow southern Italian way of life. Afternoon shop closures coincide with our la pausa, and we have stretched dinner time out past 7pm (9pm still feels out of reach). We had nearly two weeks in Lecce, and after a busy period with friends visiting we wanted to take it a bit slower. So when Amber suggested we get up at 5am to photograph the old town in the morning light, there was hesitation on Rosie’s part.
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High up on our agenda at Lecce was food. Lecce does a delicious pastry snack called the rustico - a flat puff pastry pie filled with bechamel, cheese and tiny dollop of passata. Almost as delicious as their pasticciottos - a small short crust pastry pie filled with a custard cream, flavoured with nutella or lemon or cherries or pistachio. Bakeries in Italy never fail to disappoint, and the snacks on offer change from region to region so there’s always new things to try. It does also mean that, sadly, when you leave a region you can’t have that food anymore (Rosie has not had a pasticciotto in over three weeks). We should note that gelato is the exception to this - it can (thankfully) be found everywhere in Italy.
Both of us were keen to learn how to replicate some Italian food at home, so we booked into a cooking class. We made focaccia and tiramisu, though sadly it was a tiramisu “variation” neither of us were keen to replicate (greek yoghurt, nutella, cream cheese and some crushed biscuits - very odd). The cooking class redeemed itself when the wine tasting we had no idea was included began. We got to sample several Salento wines (the Rosato being particularly good), whilst enjoying our focaccia (we did not enjoy our tiramisu) and spending time chatting with an English couple who joined us.
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After several weeks of indulging ourselves and very limited physical activity, we decided to start running each morning. We agreed to help motivate each other to get up at an Italian early hour of 7:30am, and run laps of a big block before it got too hot. On one such run Amber stumbled across a Weed (cannabis light) ATM where product could be easily purchased, after punching in your health care card number of course. We did this successfully four or five times, dodging dripping aircon juice and uneven pavers, before a heat wave settled in.
Not wanting to stray far from our aircon, we began cooking more with our first functional oven since arriving in Italy. Each person got to request a meal off the other. Rosie requested spinach and ricotta cannelloni, a breeze of a dish to re-create. Rosie was not so lucky, Amber is very fond of Rosie’s English dishes so unwittingly choose an almost impossible dish of beef and guinness pie. Poor Rosie was traipsing all over Lecce town in a heat wave trying to find Guinness, and eventually resorted to heading to the nearest Irish pub with a take away container to get a pint to la portare (take away). Whilst Amber just ducked across to the local market and got all her supplies in five minutes.
We did do some things other than eat in Lecce. We took a walking history tour to get our bearings and learn more about the town’s history. There is a huge watch tower (masquerading as a church bell tower) in the main piazza so they could look out across the ocean for invaders. Being close to Greece, Turkey and other old empires, the heel of Italy and Lecce was routinely attacked. Present day Albania is only 80 kilometres away across the ocean (we could see it from the beach). The tour finished at a house that had been excavated several floors down to ancient Roman times with old grain cellars and morgues. The excavation works were carried out by the owners teenage sons after school, and it took over a decade to excavate! We wrapped up the afternoon tour with an aperitivo of course.
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We also (kind of) started following the Euros. Neither of us really has much interest in European soccer, rather it was forced on us. All of a sudden TV screens started popping up everywhere, in every bar and restaurant, and people were glued to the soccer matches. We googled what was going on and discovered it was an important soccer tournament, the Euros. We half heartedly followed Italy through the group stages and then into the round of 16, where we watched them lose to Switzerland. There were some very sad faces in the bar that evening.
We took a day trip back to Ostuni one evening, so Amber could photograph in the evening light. There was a light grey haze hanging around so we were denied golden hour, but we enjoyed walking around in the cooler temperatures. We elected to walk back to the train station and enjoyed out stroll through the olive groves. Just as we were about to walk the final stretch on the main road, a friendly old couple offered us a ride. We both profiled them and okayed them before jumping in, wanting to avoid the inconvenience of being abducted (they dropped us safely at the station).
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After catching the wrong bus which took us on a two hour journey through Puglian countryside, we arrived at another day trip destination - Otranto. We didn’t know much about it, but clearly a lot of other tourists did as it was quite busy, kind of like a more casual Polignano filled with Europeans. The town wraps around a beautiful blue bay with crystal clear water and only a very small amount of rubbish! It was extremely inviting, but first, coffee. At the bar, Rosie decided to try something different (and avoid the chance of being served anything with UHT in it). The espressino is a coffee-mousse-whip thing and it’s very very good. Unfortunately it only comes in an espresso sized serving so it didn’t last long. For reasons that aren’t clear, Amber decided getting a snack from a dodgy looking shop called Boomerang was a good idea. Maybe she was feeling homesick, and that homesickness was surely cured when she bit into her potato croquette that tasted like it had been made with Deb instant mash. A tastebud remedy was quickly sought next door at the Pasticceria.
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After a few hours enjoying the beach and the soft sand (we will never come around to pebble beaches), we set off the explore the old town and learn some of its history. In 1480 the Ottomans invaded the town and demanded the villagers convert from Catholicism to Islam. The villagers sought refuge in the church and refused, and for this they were all executed. A monument now sits within the church with the skulls of the martyrs. Besides the skulls, the church also has some very beautiful decorations inside that are very different to the other churches we have visited.
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We have been away for nearly three months now and our hair was starting to get scraggly and Amber insisted it was time for a haircut. She completed the required research to avoid a butchering, locating a 4.8 google reviewed hair dresser and had hair dresser lingo at the ready. Amber was able to confidently ask for a layered pruning (thinning) and was very happy with her result. Rosie was less certain about being able to articulate what she wanted and her request to trim some length off (no layered pruning) resulted in a bowl haircut.
Our last days in Lecce were spent eating pasticciotto’s and avoiding the heat. We have started a tradition of going out for dinner on our last evening in a location, and it was Rosie’s turn to pick so we went to a little Mexican taco place. The international food is never amazing but its a nice way to break up a very Italian diet.
Our last stop in Puglia was Gallipoli. A beachside town on the inside of the heel. Amber had read there was a vibrant queer culture here, but when we arrived it felt more like a family holiday destination and there were no gays to be seen. Amber had been looking forward to having some nights out at the no-where-to-be-found gay bars, so it was a bit disappointing (though secretly Rosie was relieved she didn’t have to stay up past midnight in a club). We spent our days at the beach, digesting all the pastries we’d eaten from the breakfast buffet. We were staying in an old palazzo (a palace) and this was the first breakfast we’d been offered that wasn’t just an espresso and a cornetto and we didn’t waste it.
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And that’s a wrap for Puglia…we are heading back to Sicily.
Great photos🤩
Stunning photos!!! You guys make me want to do the exact same stuff you are 😜