Hotel L''Abbate Polignano a Mare

As it turns out, filling that day wasn't so much of a problem.... we tootled out of town, found a beach, wandered about & looked at the boats; tootled back, found somewhere to eat, had a chat with a few Brits and - hey presto! - before you knew it, time for bed! But the one on board was a bit more of a challenge... all 13 hours of it! BIG ...

... especially by kids - it just sounds so BOUNCY. But holy **** it makes every whine sound that much more insufferable


The Complete Pollysyllabic Spree
Nick Hornby
purchased and completed a few years ago
===============================< br>OK this is a slight cheat in that I read this book shortly after it first came out. But it's salient because it's a book of book reviews from which I'm ...

... was another accident, and guess who it was... yep the hatchback with the kid lying across the back window!!

These people are lunitics on the road, plain and simple!! Or then of course there were the enormous piles of rubbish on the side of the road, one of which self combusted in the heat and was smoking with flames!!! A totally different part of Italy to what we had seen days earlier!

Anyway we make it to Bari in time to board the overnight ferry ...

... a taxi that you haven't called. Jyles insisted though.
I checked the locks on the doors before I got in, and made sure I could escape. It was legitimate, but in a normal situation I would have said no.

We got to the ferry terminal just on time. Since it was an overnight ferry, we got bunk beds and had an awesome sleep.

... around 3.30pm, carried our bags accross and up the elevators to the reception. We got our swipe card and not escorted but told to go a floor up to our cabin. The cabin was small and SMELLED SO BAD it was disgusting. As Dave would say, it smelled like ass. Horrid and stinky were were not happy, as you opened the bathroom the smell got worse. There was an inch or 2 of water on the floor and the bin had remenants of being used (ie ...

The most surprising thing I found before leaving England was that no one even know where Basilicata was! Even friends who thought they knew Italy well weren't aware of Basilicata as its not very well known. On the plane from Stansted, most of the English people we spoke were going on holiday to visit family or friends and most were staying in Puglia, not Basilicata.

If you're planning to visit Basilicata, you will defintely need ...

... are only a small number of sleeping cabins that have to be booked way in advance and cost a lot of money. So like a lot of other people our ticket was "deck space". Meaning we could find a piece of floor somewhere and sleep. It turned out to be a pretty uncomfortable nights rest tossing and turning with about 200 other people all crammed into every nook and cranny of the boat.

My friends and I stayed at this bed and breakfast in Mola just south of Bari. It was the best yet. Large old English style accomodations, we stayed in an apartment with 2 bedrooms and 1 bath, large veranda overlooking the main street. It even had a full kitchen. The breakfast was the best we have experienced. It is worth the trip just for the accomodations. A nice beach area with breath taking views is just 10 minutes south in Polignano.

A must see for those off the tourist path.

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.

... toasted sandwiches are good. The red and white bunting that covered the old town was not as I had first hoped an expression of solidarity with the plight of Southampton Football Club, but referred rather to the fact that AS Bari had just clinched promotion to Serie A.    That evening we boarded the ferry and from the aft deck watched the sun set over western europe that we won't see again for a year.