What to do in Puglia

Puglia is the part of Italy where the food gets fresher, the architecture gets stranger, and the pace slows right down. Start your wanderings in Alberobello where the streets are lined with magnificent trulli, those cone-roofed limestone houses you've seen in postcards, then head south to Lecce, the so-called 'Florence of the South.’ On the coast, Polignano a Mare clings to a sheer cliff above grottos best explored by motorboat, while down in Salento, at the meeting point of the Adriatic and Ionian seas, a private catamaran is the way to do it. The food, of course, is half the reason we’d come to Puglia: burrata at the source, capocollo in Martina Franca, and olive oil pressed at one of the numerous and lovely frantoio. And don't skip Matera, just over the Basilicata border, where you'll walk through cave dwellings inhabited for nine thousand years and watch fourth-generation bakers make the city's famous bread.