Day 30 Sunday 15 September

We have 4 nights and 3 full days in Otranto, so we have tried to plan a rest day, some beach time as well a visit to Lecce – reportedly one of the most beautiful of the white towns. It’s old town is surrounded by a reasonably sized (medium) modern city so we may take public transport for that day trip. So to help our planning last night we checked the weather forecast for winds to see when it will be the calmest beach day. Whilst its very warm – pretty much 28-30 degrees every day, there is still the moderate northerly blowing like when we were in Puglia, so we would like have the calmest day for beaches for that postcard south Italian experience.

Our day started with a rooftop breakfast looking across the rustic roof tops of charming Otranto to the perfect blue sea. The breakfast food is a bit of a come down from our lovely Marielle breakfasts and I had hoped for better with this standard of accommodation, but we still had a lovey start to the day.

Today we chose to do a road trip down around the bottom of the heel via the coastal road to S. Maria Leuca which is the town on the cape where the Adriatic and Ionian seas meet, and then drive up the arch of the foot along the Italian Maldives for a bit of beach hopping until we reached Gallipoli and then return inland in a direct line to Otranto.

The road trip commenced on a narrow one lane, two way road along a very rocky, dry cliff edged coast complete with regular winding parts that required extra caution for oncoming traffic. On the left of us the sea was a deep and bright dark sapphire blue, the sky above an endless light blue, and on the right the rocky hills are punctuated with flatter areas with half dead olive trees and the occasional tilled paddocks with dark terracotta brown soil. We have worked out that they build the low fences from the rocks in the paddock to allow more tillable soil for cropping.

We passed through some quaint small settlements perched on the cliff side but didn’t stop for a swim as you have to go down quite a cliff face to the water (and then back up again) and there is really minimal parking in these tiny places. However, we made our first stop at Santa Cesarea Terme as the water access looked promising. As it happened it was not as accessible as we wanted given our time frames – albeit very pretty with some locals snorkelling and diving for Kina (sea urchin) in crystal clear green blue water. Overlooking the gorgeous blue sea was a fairy tale shabby chic Moorish style palace from the 14th century, making a very picturesque village scene.

Not long after this town we actually saw our first road casualty with a car vs. scooter. Scooter was pretty messed up, but other than shock, it didn’t look like a hospital injury. We think a car was entering the main road and didn’t see the scooter. We were able to pass carefully and continue.

Onward and the landscape became a little greener with mixed trees, continuing the scenic drive. We were passing over a little bridge and on the right was a beautiful deep rocky gorge. Vern asked if I wanted to pull over, and I said yes as I thought he would also enjoy looking at it. There also seem some parking available around and a couple of little cafe which would provide a good comfort stop and espresso shot.

Vern skilfully and carefully executed a u-turn and we were lucky to grab a park from an exiting car nearby. What a surprise as we crossed the bridge – on the sea side was an incredible emerald, turquoise and sapphire grotto and inlet. To access this grotto you can go by boat – or you could simply walk down the steps along the cliff and swim. We contemplated the hike down, but needs for a comfort stop were pressing so we used facilities and had a coffee – sweating away in the shade. We discovered that we were in fact at a key tourist site called Grotte Ciolo.

Whilst the water looked very tempting we decided to move on as it was pretty deep and best attempted with fins on with the currents, and possibly a bit cool? We were fairly close to Leuca so pressed on. There are some nice historic sights to see in the town, but we have reached saturation point with a lot of the churches and crumbling castle ruins and just want to have some down time in the open space and water.

The towns here in Southern Italy are quite unattractive and shabby – an indication of not so affluent areas, so for us the attraction lies with gorgeous turquoise and aqua seas. Constant sweating in hot white washed dry dirty dusting towns is also becoming unappealing. A note on rubbish – the roadside, including highways is littered with rubbish – its disgusting. Add to that graffiti, crumbling buildings, flaking paint, a lot of abandoned buildings and dead trees – the “Charming Puglia” that is a being promoted is very selective in its spots.

We passed a huge light house and then the large port that lines Leuca. There are some areas for swimming but we were expecting more scenic beaches further along so we kept on and not far up the road were able to stop at what appeared our first sand beach. It was a mixture of paid and unpaid beach. The spot where we got a park was a reasonable distance from a place to have lunch as well so we moved on a bit further again till we saw a tower (Torre Vado), and little protected harbour and a few food looking places. By the tower there happened to be a stand alone building like a food truck.

The one man band inside didn’t speak any English, had longish hair and missing teeth – and the general appearance like he was off a pirate ship but I trusted my instinct and with the help of a fellow ticket seller local we ordered – Vern having a cheese filled pastry. Under the shade of an umbrella and with gentle sea breezes I got to enjoy my fist mixed fried seafood of fresh squid, octopus and prawns. My selection was really lovely – so fresh and light that I ate the prawns shell and all. The salt level was higher than I am used to, but as previously mentioned that seems to be the way here. I had a nice lemon wedge that I squeezed over to counteract it. All up with coffees was €15, the view and ambience was free!

We could see beyond the port a good stretch of beaches, so we drove on a little until we could park (again a bit of guess work as to whether we were actually allowed to park there – and whether we could enter what looked like a paid beach). But in good kiwi style we headed over the sand dunes and plonked our towel and bag like we knew what we were doing and belonged there.

In like a manatee it was deliciously warm and no shock to the body despite the very warm 30 degree day. The beaches here are very shallow and quite protected so are fantastic for children and less confident water skilled people. We kept a watchful eye on our bag and simply enjoyed the beautiful water – which is one of our favourite things to do. I think the name of the beach was Lido Marini or Fellonici.

Time to move on, and up the coast about 40 minutes to Gallipoli where we stopped and actually paid €3 to go onto the main big beach there called San Giovanni. The guy tried to rip us off at first for €10 but I pointed to the price sign and he gave me the right change. Funny as we walked up Vern said “he looks like a crook”, it really is a put off this sort of behaviour. You have to be careful all the time. Unlike home, where standards are so different and there is recourse, and or public or social damage you can do. Here there will be another thousand tourists coming through the next day (if not more) – so they just don’t care and will maximise any opportunity to get or make money how and when they can. Tsssk.

San Giovanni was also very beautiful, warm, calm and clear. Light soft golden sands fringe pale aqua water that slowly gets darker blue towards the deeper water and horizon. Whilst relaxing and feeling very happy and at peace something decided to eat me, I felt a nice sting on my thigh – nearly making me leap up and out of the water. Vern thought this funny, as at the same time he started to get nibbled on his feet by a small group of fish. We think these might be like the ones you pay to clean your feet in Asia – so we stayed still and got our feet exfoliated for free!

The coast and the beaches in particular get a 5* manatee rating. If you drew a line across from where we are you would hit Corfu and Greece mainland. This water here is similar to the islands there. The buzz for us today was swimming in two seas, getting to the bottom of the heel of Italy and enjoying the rugged but picturesque scenery.

We lingered quite a while in the water and then as the sun started to get a bit low we headed inland and across the heel to home before final sundown, enjoying a dusky sunset on arrival to Otranto. We used Fork and Spoon again to book dinner and got 20% discount on a pleasant but not notable meal.

I had a nice selection of seafood entree for €16 but again it was over cooked which annoys me for a place that is all about seafood. Really says a lot about the general skill of the run of the mill chefs. Vern had a burrata and ricotta with honey and nuts for his entree which was actually a lot better – very creamy and delicious, and for mains we had the beans again with nicely cooked chicory and an orecchiette with sausage and tomato. The sausage was minimal and not tasty like in Matera tasting a bit like small pieces of boiled plain pork sausage. The orecchiette were also a bit bland and not up to my new standard. I think they were just out of a packet and not freshly made.

(Apero spritz)

Oh well, I realise we cant have fabulous meals every single night on holiday and I am content to have a few good taste experiences to try out replicating when I get home and pasta is one of them, along with the Matera bread and beans….