What an amazing kind of day!!

Two shots of trulli; one of the Via Traiana and another of the ruins!
More trulli to follow!

Sunday, November 30, 2008

Wow!! What a great day! Up around 7, showered and down for breakfast. To be honest, one of the worst – rolls and juice, and that was about it! Think we might have been able to wrestle a cup of coffee for R, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort. Then, we headed back across town to see if the archeological museum was open … it wasn’t! Looked yesterday like it was undergoing major renovation, but wanted to make sure … so, back to the hotel, picked up the car, and headed out of town for a drive.

Absolutely beautiful day! Probably almost 70 degrees, blue skies, and nice brisk breeze! Headed north, toward Bari, for the ruins at Egnazia. And – surprise! – both ruins and museum were open! Very large excavation area – the town and the acropolis. Some interesting and very old (16th Century B.C.) finds; an unusual black pottery that was locally famous. The town included an excavation of a portion of the Via Traiana; now we have another road to go with the Via Appia Antica! We wandered around enjoying the ruins and the sunshine, then headed inland.

And here, we ran into Trulli!! And they are, truly, wonderful! Very interesting architecture – little pointed round roofs with funny decorations on top! They’re everywhere – the area we drove through was call Valle d’Itria, but really should have been called Valley of the Trulli! Some trulli were only one dome; but other places had six or seven! Such an odd sight – like nothing we’ve ever seen before, and they’re found only in this area of Italy! Actually just wandered at one point, following one small road after another. (Fortunately, with R and Rosy (the GPS), it’s impossible to get completely lost…)

By this time it was almost 1, and we were hungry – drove into Locorotondo, hoping to find food – but, like in Brindisi yesterday afternoon, seemed like everything was closed! Wasn’t sure what we were going to do, when we headed out on a small road and there was a sign advertising a restaurant/pizzeria – called Sette Trulli! (Seven Trulli!) Followed the signs for a half mile or so, and pulled into a parking lot that actually had other cars! R went in to see if they were really open – and voila, they were! Got a table for two underneath one of the trulli – we had a two-table trulli to ourselves! (There were three other trulli rooms which were all set out with large round tables, obviously for large groups – two of which were taken up by families having their Sunday dinner!)

Waitress comes and this is where we find that 1) no English spoken, which is fine, but 2) no menus to look at! She’ll just tell you what they have! She asked first if we wanted antipasti – and me, loving antipasti of most kinds, said SI! Then, we figured out that we could get anchelotte pasta (semi-circular ravioli) stuffed with porcini mushrooms! So…we waited.

First comes the antipasti – and it comes, and it comes…We had: plate of ham with mozzarella as well as one other cheese; 4 anchovies (which R said were WONDERFUL…YEK…); deep-fried potato balls (which were GREAT!); large piece of crab meat in a 1000 island-type dressing; small plate of salami. Then came the hot stuff – cheese wrapped in bacon; eggplant with cheese; ham and cheese in puffed pastry; small calzone. The only thing that we did NOT touch was the “seafood salad” – those calamari tentacles are STILL following us around Italy!!

Then came the pasta! Absolutely wonderful! Light as air; excellent porcini stuffing, with a cream and butter sauce and chunks of porcini mushrooms with parsley. Wow! Talk about stuffed! However, have to admit that I’d been eyeing the small dessert refrigerator that was in our trulli…so, I got the pane chocolato (I know I’m not spelling that right!) – but it was a chocolate cake, drizzled in chocolate syrup and topped with powdered sugar. R ordered café American, which wasn’t understood, so he tried again with café nero (black) – and got, of course, a cup of sludge!!! (My apologies to anybody who really likes to drink that stuff…) Also had a couple glasses of Prosecco…

Decided that a direct route back to Brindisi would be best, as we both wanted naps by this time. (It was almost a 2-hour lunch, but the time passes SO pleasantly, that it doesn’t seem like that long!) Fortunately, just like yesterday in Brindisi, the people just seem to disappear during the afternoons! Where are they, and WHAT are they doing?? At any rate, cruised back into town – only to somehow lose our hotel, and make what seemed to me like a complete circuit up and down every one way street in town!! UGH! How come it was so easy to find yesterday?? Finally pulled up at the hotel and unloaded. R says we’re in for the night, as NO need to find anything more to eat today! (Not sure where we’d put it anyway, even if we looked!) So, looks like we’ll be spending a quiet evening watch calcio (soccer) on TV (right now, Arsenal just scored to go 2-1 up on Chelsea!) (Bob, Kate: Remember when they won the FA Cup and we were THERE?)

So, on that note, I will close! Not sure about posting a blog tomorrow, as we will be heading to a B&B in Lecce for two nights; no idea if they have any internet access at all (although R does have the list of Earthlink telephone numbers, but going out on a phone line is SO time consuming!) So, while I will definitely be writing each day, everything may have to wait to post until we get back to Matera on Wednesday. (R SO looking forward to “his” cave…) Have decided that we will actually stop and do laundry on our way into Matera this time. Oh! And for anyone who might have a need to know: Brindisi has at least TWO lavanderia automatico (self-service) – too bad we didn’t have enough to keep them busy! Oh well!!

More later!
Love,
m