Puglia and Matera: Trulli, Lecce and the Salento Coast

1. Day 1: Arrive in Bari

   Bari Karol Wojtyła Airport to your hotel in Bari

   • Drive about 30 min
   • Welcome dinner
   • Stay in Bari
   Day 1 details

   Fly into Bari Karol Wojtyła Airport (BRI), about 10 km from the city centre, where a driver meets you and brings you to a central hotel within walking distance of Bari Vecchia, the old town. Plan to land by mid-afternoon; the exact meeting time comes with your final itinerary. At about 6 pm your See Sight Tours guide meets the group for a short briefing on the week ahead, then leads a first walk through the old town as the lights come on: the Basilica di San Nicola, built to hold the relics of St Nicholas that Bari sailors brought from Myra in 1087, the Romanesque Cattedrale di San Sabino, and Strada Arco Basso, where women make orecchiette by hand at tables outside their front doors. We come out on the seafront promenade and sit down together to a welcome dinner of Apulian dishes at a local trattoria. Bari is the only one-night stop on the trip.

   Included

   • Pick-up at Bari Karol Wojtyła Airport (BRI)
   • Welcome briefing with your guide
   • Evening walk in Bari Vecchia: the Basilica di San Nicola, the Cattedrale di San Sabino and Strada Arco Basso
   • Welcome dinner

   Free time: Free until the evening briefing

   

2. Day 2: Trani by the sea, then Matera

   Bari to Trani, then inland to Matera

   • Drive about 2.5 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Matera
   Day 2 details

   We leave Bari at about 9 am and drive 45 minutes up the coast to Trani, a small port built of pale limestone. Its Cathedral of San Nicola Pellegrino, begun in 1099, stands on its own at the edge of the sea, and in the morning the stone looks almost white against the water. Your guide takes you through the cathedral and down into its crypts, then into the Swabian castle that Frederick II began in 1233, and along the harbour, where fishing boats tie up at the quay. Lunch is seafood in Trani. In the early afternoon we cross the Murgia plateau, a high plain of wheat fields and dry-stone walls, about an hour and a half inland to Matera in Basilicata, where we stay two nights in or beside the Sassi. The evening is free: walk out to a belvedere above the Sasso Barisano at dusk, when the cave houses light up one by one, and choose your own dinner.

   Included

   • Trani with your guide: the Cathedral of San Nicola Pellegrino and its crypts, and the harbour
   • The Swabian castle in Trani
   • Seafood lunch in Trani

   Free time: Evening free in Matera

3. Day 3: The Sassi of Matera, early

   A full day in Matera, with the Murgia Timone viewpoint

   • Drive about 30 min
   • Breakfast and dinner
   • Stay in Matera
   Day 3 details

   We start at about 8:30 am, before the day-trip groups arrive, with a local Matera guide. The Sassi are two districts of houses, churches and cisterns cut into the limestone side of a ravine, the Gravina, and lived in for thousands of years; UNESCO listed them in 1993 together with the rock churches of the plateau across the gorge. We walk down through the Sasso Caveoso to the rock church of Santa Maria de Idris, step inside a furnished cave house that shows how families lived alongside their animals until the 1950s, when the Italian state moved the inhabitants to new districts, and finish under Piazza Vittorio Veneto in the Palombaro Lungo, a huge rock-cut cistern you cross on a walkway. The afternoon is free. Late in the day we drive 15 minutes to the Murgia Timone viewpoint across the ravine to see the whole city in low sun, from the Sasso Caveoso to the convent of Sant'Agostino on the rim of the ravine, then have dinner together at a restaurant in the Sassi.

   Included

   • The Sassi with a local guide: the Sasso Caveoso and the rock church of Santa Maria de Idris
   • A furnished cave house
   • The Palombaro Lungo cistern
   • The Murgia Timone viewpoint in the late afternoon
   • Dinner in the Sassi

   Easier option: Skip the steep descent to Santa Maria de Idris: wait at a cafe in Piazza Vittorio Veneto and join the group for the Palombaro Lungo.

   More active option: Walk to Murgia Timone instead of driving: down from the Sasso Caveoso, across the suspension bridge over the Gravina and up the far side, about 1.5 hours with a steep climb (path and bridge conditions permitting).

   Free time: Afternoon free in Matera

   Activity: About 3 hours on foot in the morning on stone steps and steep lanes; Matera has few flat streets. Shoes with grip help.

   

4. Day 4: Alberobello and into the Valle d'Itria

   Matera to Alberobello, then a masseria in the Valle d'Itria

   • Drive about 1.5 h
   • Breakfast and dinner
   • Stay in Valle d'Itria
   Day 4 details

   An hour and a quarter north-east across the Murgia brings us to Alberobello by about 10 am, ahead of the midday coaches. The town is built of trulli, limestone houses with dry-stone conical roofs, and was listed by UNESCO in 1996. With a local guide we walk up through Rione Monti, a hillside of trulli that are now shops and guesthouses, to the trullo church of Sant'Antonio, then cross to Aia Piccola, the quieter quarter where people still live in them, and step inside the Trullo Sovrano, the town's two-storey trullo. Lunch is your choice in town. In the early afternoon we drive about 20 minutes to our masseria, a fortified farmhouse among olive groves and vineyards that is home for the next three nights, so you can unpack properly. The rest of the afternoon is for settling in or a walk along the farm lanes, and dinner tonight is at the masseria, cooked from what the farm and the valley grow.

   Included

   • Alberobello with a local guide: Rione Monti, the trullo church of Sant'Antonio and Aia Piccola
   • The Trullo Sovrano
   • Dinner at the masseria

   Free time: Lunch on your own in Alberobello; late afternoon free at the masseria

   Activity: Rione Monti is built on a slope, with short steep lanes.

   

5. Day 5: Olive oil, orecchiette and Locorotondo

   The Valle d'Itria: an olive farm, Locorotondo and Cisternino

   • Drive about 1 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Valle d'Itria
   Day 5 details

   This is the food day. In the morning we drive a short way to an olive farm in the valley, where the producer walks you through groves of old trees and explains how the oil is made, from picking to pressing; from about late October to December the harvest is on and you may see the mill working. Taste several oils side by side with bread, then roll up your sleeves: a local cook shows you how to make orecchiette by hand from durum wheat semolina and water, drawn across a board with a knife, with a sauce of cime di rapa or tomato depending on the season. What you make is lunch. In the afternoon we drive 15 minutes to Locorotondo, a round white town on a hilltop with views over the trulli-dotted valley, and taste its dry white wine at a cantina. The evening is free: rest at the masseria, or the van takes you to Cisternino for a fornello pronto, a butcher's shop that grills meat to order.

   Included

   • Olive farm visit and olive oil tasting
   • Orecchiette lesson with a local cook, and the lunch you make
   • Locorotondo with your guide
   • Wine tasting at a cantina in Locorotondo

   Optional experiences

   • Dinner at a fornello pronto in Cisternino (the van ride is included, dinner is on you)

   Easier option: Skip Locorotondo and stay at the masseria after lunch.

   More active option: Walk to Locorotondo with your guide on country lanes between dry-stone walls and trulli, about 8 km, and meet the group at the cantina.

   Free time: Evening free

6. Day 6: Polignano a Mare and the white town of Ostuni

   Valle d'Itria to Polignano a Mare, then Ostuni, and back to the masseria

   • Drive about 2 h
   • Breakfast
   • Stay in Valle d'Itria
   Day 6 details

   We reach Polignano a Mare at about 9 am, before the beach crowds, and walk the old town on its limestone cliffs above the Adriatic, out to the terraces that look down on Lama Monachile, the pebble cove cut between two cliffs, and on to the sea caves below the houses. The rest of the morning is yours: swim at Lama Monachile in season, sit over a coffee on the cliff, or take a boat out to the caves. Lunch is your choice in Polignano, where raw seafood and fried fish are the local habit. In the afternoon we drive down the coast and climb to Ostuni, the white town on a hill above a plain of olive trees that runs to the sea. Your guide walks you up through whitewashed lanes to the 15th-century cathedral at the top. The evening is free for an aperitivo on the walls as the light goes and dinner in town, and the van brings everyone back to the masseria at an agreed time.

   Included

   • Polignano a Mare with your guide: the old town, the cliff terraces and Lama Monachile
   • Ostuni with your guide: the old town and the cathedral
   • The van back to the masseria after dinner in Ostuni

   Optional experiences

   • A boat trip to the sea caves of Polignano a Mare (in season, extra cost)

   Free time: Late morning and lunch free in Polignano; evening free in Ostuni

   Activity: Ostuni's old town is steep, with stepped lanes up to the cathedral.

   

7. Day 7: Baroque Lecce

   Valle d'Itria to Lecce

   • Drive about 1.5 h
   • Breakfast and lunch
   • Stay in Lecce
   Day 7 details

   After breakfast we leave the masseria and drive about an hour and a half south, past Brindisi and into the Salento, the flat peninsula at the heel of Italy. Lecce is built of pietra leccese, a soft honey-coloured limestone that masons carved into the city's baroque facades in the 17th century. With a local guide we walk from Porta Napoli to the Basilica di Santa Croce, its facade crowded with animals, cherubs and a great rose window, into the enclosed Piazza del Duomo, and on to Piazza Sant'Oronzo, where a partly excavated Roman amphitheatre of the 2nd century AD lies below street level beside the column of the city's patron saint. We stop at a cartapesta workshop, where papier-mache saints are still shaped by hand, then sit down to lunch together. The afternoon and evening are free, and the hotel is inside or beside the old town, so everything is a short walk.

   Included

   • Lecce with a local guide: Porta Napoli, the Basilica di Santa Croce, Piazza del Duomo, Piazza Sant'Oronzo and the Roman amphitheatre
   • A cartapesta (papier-mache) workshop
   • Lunch in Lecce

   Free time: Afternoon and evening free in Lecce

   Activity: About 2.5 hours of flat walking on stone paving.

   

8. Day 8: Otranto and the Salento coast

   Lecce to Otranto and Punta Palascìa, then north along the coast to Roca and back to Lecce

   • Drive about 2 h
   • Breakfast, lunch and dinner
   • Stay in Lecce
   Day 8 details

   We drive 45 minutes to Otranto, a walled town on the Adriatic, and go first to the cathedral, whose floor is a single mosaic laid in 1163 to 1165 by a monk named Pantaleone: a Tree of Life carried on the backs of elephants, with Alexander the Great, King Arthur and the labours of the months among its branches. A side chapel holds the remains of the townspeople killed when an Ottoman force took Otranto in 1480. Your guide walks you round the walls of the Aragonese castle and down to the harbour, and lunch is fish by the sea. In the afternoon we drive to Punta Palascìa, the most easterly point of mainland Italy, where on a clear day the mountains of Albania show across the strait. Then north along the cliffs to Roca, where we stop at the Grotta della Poesia, a round sinkhole in the limestone open to the sky with the sea flowing in beneath, and walk the cliff edge past the ruins of the old fortified town. Swimming is not allowed in the cave; we come to look. Back in Lecce, we end with a farewell dinner.

   Included

   • Otranto with your guide: the cathedral and its mosaic floor, the castle walls and the harbour
   • Lunch in Otranto
   • Punta Palascìa, the most easterly point of mainland Italy
   • The Grotta della Poesia at Roca, with the entry ticket
   • Farewell dinner in Lecce

   Easier option: Stay in Otranto for the afternoon at a harbour cafe or the beach below the walls; the van collects you on the way north.

   More active option: Walk the coastal path from Otranto to Punta Palascìa with your guide, about 6 km, and meet the van at the lighthouse.

   Activity: Wear shoes with grip: the cliff paths at Punta Palascìa and the rock around the Grotta della Poesia at Roca are uneven, with unfenced edges.

   

9. Day 9: Lecce to Brindisi Airport

   Lecce to Brindisi Airport (BDS), or by train to Bari

   • Drive about 45 min
   • Breakfast
   Day 9 details

   A last breakfast in Lecce, and if your flight is later, time for a pasticciotto, the custard-filled pastry the city eats in the morning, and a final walk through the old town. Your guide sees the group to Brindisi Airport (BDS), about 40 minutes away, with a transfer leaving mid-morning; book a flight leaving after about 12:30 pm. Brindisi connects through Rome, Milan and other European hubs for the flight home. If you are flying from Bari instead, we book you on a train from Lecce to Bari Centrale, about an hour and a half to two hours, and you take the airport train from there: tell us when you book, and plan on a flight after about 3 pm. If you want to stay longer in the Salento, or carry on to the Amalfi Coast on the other side of the country, ask us and we can add nights in Lecce or connect you to our Amalfi Coast trip.

   Included

   • Drop-off at Brindisi Airport (BDS), or a train ticket from Lecce to Bari Centrale

   Activity: Book a flight from Brindisi after about 12:30 pm, or from Bari after about 3 pm.

Wildlife and weather: Spring and early autumn are warm and good for walking; July and August can pass 40 C inland and the coast is at its busiest in August, so we keep walks to the morning. The olive harvest runs from about late October.

• Bari1 night
• Matera2 nights
• Valle d'Itria3 nights
• Lecce2 nights