Day 24 Sunday 8 September

Our day started with a most beautiful breakfast of local produce. They are economical owners – here – the finishes are not quite up there in the room – albeit the price was. That said, the location and the service are top class. So the breakfast was served on buffet with little portions but each one was a delicious mouthful. Local prosciutto, salami sausage, cheeses, Matera bread, whole meal croissants (the best croissant I have ever eaten), mini cherry tomato pizza slice with crunch olive oil soaked outer, mini cheese and prosciutto toasties, cherry butter cake, chocolate and coconut cake, and jam slice like linzer torte, and a pastry similar to what we had in Norway- latticed crispy flakey pastry topped with hazelnuts and filled with sweet apple purée. A local fig jam, and marmalade. Lots of detail on the food, but it was really really good and worth noting to remember. Two proper coffees freshly prepared and served with a smile. Yes we were set for the day.

Photo from our room – sun out today

We took our time after eating to research our activities for the day – it was very warm, around 30 degrees and the mellow yellows and biscuit colours of yesterday where now brilliant bone white and reflective. We sorted our dinner – the best places get booked out, and re watched a video blog on Matera that we had used for our planning to get some ideas of what to do. We confirmed that we would do our water well walk at 5:30 pm (lucky we pre booked as they were sold out today for all the slots except for a few from 9-10am), and visit the cathedral (Duomo) and another old 15th century church below ground.

We wondered about sitting it out and resting a bit (try and get rid of these colds), perhaps catch up on blogs, but this place is so unique I said to Vernon that we should go as hard as we could and blogging could wait. I expect our time to be easier the next 9 days, so will just do some brief notes and fill in later. Verns cold is not good at all and I have started to sniffle and sneeze so think its well on the way to joining him. Love the little fig tree coming out of the building.

We also debated where to head for lunch and planned our walking around that to be as few hills and steps and allow time to have a wee rest. First restaurant only about 10 minutes away up the hill – gentle road taken – was booked out when we got there, so we booked it for dinner and changed our plan to visit the other places and grab something near there. This change required careful planning as to avoid an up and down repeat of the hill and Vern skilfully took us around a ridge and then downhill to the crypt church.

About 15 minutes later we got to the other restaurant we wanted to go to but it was closed. All good there was another little one a couple of doors down so we went inside and ordered a light lunch hoping to find some respite from the heat. Despite a little aircon unit up high, it was still very warm and sticky as it seems in eateries here and this brings on power surges to compound things. Ah well, nothing I can do about it except flap my fan and drink lots of water. As it happened our lunch was very nice (I seem to be using that descriptor a lot). We shared a local specialty of pasta with pork sausage in tomato sauce and crispy peppers, and a salad with tomato, walnuts, pecorino and crispy peppers. The also had a salad with horse strips, but of course I skipped that one.

A note on the crispy peppers which are delicious and particular also to this region. They are dried and can be used crushed in an assortment of things like risotto or pasta or other seasoning, or like we had them today – fried in olive oil and snacked on or crowning other dishes.

Lunch including two sparkling waters only came to 24€, which is pretty cheap. The crypt church was just across the way, and we enjoyed a quick view admiring the frescoes which are in pretty good condition before bracing ourselves for another walk up the ridge to the Duomo. The Duomo also has a long history to the 17th century, and was surprisingly grand for such a small city. The arches below are of an old church – now part of one of the many squares.

We returned home, thoroughly delighting in the lanes and allowing ourselves to get ‘lost’ in the general direction of home – on the right gradient. This place has us both buzzing with amazement at its beauty. We are really loving it.

Note the tiny church carved into hill on centre photo, our place is just under that carved into same rock.

We returned home for a quick break and then went up a short cut – which transpired to be the steepest possible steps up – to the water well tour. I am quite pleased and surprised how well we are managing all the walking and steps – didn’t even get out of breath and it was a good 7 minute steep upwards climb. Knees are also holding out, which at my age I am also very thankful for. Matera is not a place for those with mobility issues unfortunately.

The well tour was interesting to view, but there was only an Italian commentary by the guide. We were given an english leaflet with our tickets. Essentially it is a man made cave created in the 16th century that collects water from springs. The cave is a series of a number of caves as the municipality confiscated cellars near by to extend the original cave. The total capacity of the cistern reached 5 million litres. Because limestone leaks they had to plaster it to keep it water tight. These days it is not used – and is drained and they must make heaps of money from visitors. I am not sure where the town supply comes from now. The tour only took 20 minutes and then we returned home – taking yet another route and making new discoveries.

A little rest, another shower and time to walk up the hill to dinner in the then calm of a star and moonlit sky and soft golden glow of street light.

Dinner was again very good – I think it is hard to eat poorly in Matera. We are struggling to make it to dessert as the entree – pasta dishes tend to fill us up – never mind make it to a secondi (mains) dish. Tonight we had a pasta dish each – me a turnip top creme with anchovies and fried bread crumbs and Vern had a ham, leek and pulse sauce. For main we shared a lamb hot pot – slow cooked in oven then flash cooked with a thin layer of sourdough – almost pizza like dough. NOM NOM all the way.

We could have just rolled down the hill home – very satisfied and relaxed. We move on to the coast tomorrow, and other than the hard bed I could have stayed here another day. We both can highly recommend this as a destination for something different and enjoyable.