Ambasciatori Grand Hotel Bari

... shouldn't have taken the first agent's word for it. Seemed to be ships sailing at all hours - must surely have been one with space on it overnight? Definitely the only way to do this route.However, we get by: but I wouldn't recommend Ventourist line: cheap, for sure; but tacky -very, very tacky!Another night in an anonymous port.

... and above all their gallows humor to keep sane.

And of course, it's an ace in the hole when playing Wire fandom one-upmanship. You can totally lay the smackdown on anyone who thinks they're hardcore just because they listened to the director commentary. In my case this was necessary because Danilo, who I got started on the Wire in the first place, finished season 5 before I did.


Friends ...

... main street and walked up looking at the shops, looking inside the house of a wealthy politician that has been well preserved. Back on the street they still had working water fountains, well preserved signs and we wandered off towards the main square and the forum. We looked inside the cages that hold the remains of the artifacts, including the casts of the bodies that are also on display at the Melbourne Museaum. Enzo then took us to ...

... typically Italian, it was little surprise to find that this was once part of ancient Magna Graecia; in fact you are more likely to stumble upon Greek temples than you are Roman ruins. Known in Italy as a land of myth and fable, this little region was clearly full of surprises.

Whenever I think back to the first day in Basilicata, images of mountains, beautiful scenery and sunny skies fill my thoughts - a lovely start to the holiday!

... also on the train (we ended up seeing them again later). They were an Australian couple.

We took our final train to Bari. When we got there we ran into 3 other back packers who happened to be from (believe it or not) SPOKANE, WASHINGTON!!! Unbelievable.

We took a bus to the ferry terminal, booked our ferry ride. Went back to the city for dinner and to get food for ...

This is where Pietro, an old Italian guy, jumped into Bruce and navigated us to the trulli. He saved us from a traffic jam in the narrow streets of Puglia.

Pete was also called Pietro while in Italy. :-)

Trullo comes from the Greek word, "tholos" – meaning “dome”. See the pictures of the wee houses.

We found the Belvedere pub here too - also the name of our local in Aus – meaning “beautiful view”. It was beautiful.

... emailed the hotel and asked them to do it. They also brought out a fruit pizza!!! It was good, but no where near as good as Sheilas! This morning we had our last class with Antonio, then we had Italian at 3 and right after Italian we went to our Italian teacher's house. She is Pino's sister and she is so nice to us! she absolutely loves us, except when we're in class... haha. We had some juice and more pastries. Her house is even more beautiful, and i couldn't resist taking ...

... you could stay the night, that had a little bar and restaurant) the owner was quite friendly when there were no other Italians there. (we figured it'd be bad for his image to be seen being friendly to English tourists) We went for some late lunch there after a walk, we were the only ones in there, he was very accommodating, made us the most delicious pasta dishes but then he wanted to talk, would'nt let us leave. It was really hard work though as he didn't speak English and I only had ...

... ferries in a row - it seemed wise to get some sleep at least one of those nights, and a cabin on Montenegro Lines was inexpensive compared to the Greek lines. I laugh now to think that we checked in as early as possible, so as to lounge around in our swanky cabin. The cabin was *disgusting* - even Mitch was a little appalled. Refer to the posted picture of the bathroom floor, which appeared not to have been cleaned in weeks. So, my advice for others is just to ...

Packed up and left the hostel. Decided to head to the train station at the bottom of the hill to save me from walking to the one at the top of the hill. The next train to leave the station at the bottom of the hill was in about an hour. Didn't want to waste time waiting around, so I walked to the station at the top of the hill. Arrived feeling hot and sweaty. Caught the train and 15 minutes later I was ...