Puglia: a home from home

“Do you remember that waiter?”

“No, but I remember the older one.”

“Really? But he served us last time too!”

We’re back in Gallipoli on Puglia’s western coast. On the edge of the old town, looking out towards the Ionian Sea. The wind is whipping up and the glass veranda at La Puritate is rattling, causing some looks of concern from the tour group of Americans that have just been seated at a long table beside us.

It’s almost two years to the day that we came here last and had some of the most enjoyable pasta we’ve ever eaten.

Linguine alle vongole and mezzo pacchero ai frutti di mare. Simple stuff really. Yet simplicity is often hard to do well. There’s no hiding place.

Needless to say, our return didn’t disappoint. Vongole again for my wife. Linguine alla palamita (a relation of tuna) this time, for me.

It’s simple, restrained yet elegant cooking. Very much three adjectives to best describe Puglia itself.

It feels nice to return. Nice to know it wasn’t a one-off encounter.

Sunbathers. Gallipoli, Puglia.

It’s our fifth visit to Puglia. Our previous visit was our honeymoon, following our wedding at a masseria just outside Carovigno.

The sense of ease and familiarity unsurprisingly follows us around on the trip.

A return to the masseria to say hello and have a coffee with the house manager, Chiara, brings back many memories of the big day. The wedding photos in the windy weather. Some improv karaoke by some of our guests as the night drew late. Everyone sitting together to eat dinner at a long table beside the pool.

In the present, we share stories with Chiara. Our travelling in the first half of the year. Swapping anecdotes about the Philippines. Informing her, to her delight, that we are in Puglia to begin looking at buying somewhere that we can rent out and use when we feel like it.

Puglia feels like ‘our place’. We were married here, of course, and have visited many times. It was our first holiday abroad together. We feel comfortable here. Relaxed. Content.

Sitting on the terrace at the masseria we feel all those things too. Early autumnal sun beating down and the Adriatic Sea glistening in the distance as we ask where the best local place to buy focaccia ripiena is.

The following day and there’s a rendezvous with an estate agent at a petrol station on the outskirts of Ostuni. Not the picture postcard ‘La Città Bianca’ Ostuni, the more modern part that’s messy in places, sometimes ugly too.

Southern Italy, like anywhere else, isn’t just a dream. There’s real life too. Bizarre exits from the autostrada, littered with potholes and lined with litter. Towns which don’t fit the Instagram ideal and are just places that people live and work. God forbid.

We wait for the agent whilst observing some stereotypical Italian driving etiquette. As people park their cars however they feel, to go and visit the shops over the road. The use of the hazard lights a seeming protection against wrongdoing.

The agent arrives and pulls up parallel to us. With the windows wound down, we discuss next steps. She pulls off the forecourt and we follow. I realise I’ve never done this before. Putting blind faith in a stranger as we follow her Puegot 206 along the rabbit warren of dusty red tracks leading from the main roads south of Ostuni, into the heart of trulli territory.

The conical cones of one of Puglia’s most distinctive sights - a trullo

That familiarity is back though as we begin snaking around narrow roads. The stone walls either side appearing to move closer and closer inwards as rows of olive and fruit trees get denser. Trulli, more frequent.

We turn. Turn again. Left, right, right, left, right. I lose all sense of direction.

And then we slow down. There’s a small driveway to our right.

“This must be it.”

We turn and head up a long driveway lined with fig and olive trees. There’s a metal gate at the end. Flanked either side by white stone plinths.

It feels like we’ve been here before, except we haven’t.

“I already love it,” says my wife.

“So do I,” I respond.

The gates open and we creep slowly along the drive before parking the car beneath an almond tree.

An image of Puglia is before us. A white stone trullo. Conical roofline. Large outdoor terrace. Expansive gardens of dry red earth and hardy trees.

Could this be our new home from home?

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