Hotel Terranobile 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.

... interruption in the reading, as well as the logistical challenges of the books themselves (I had to ask Vaneet to take The Corner to Bangalore so I wouldn't have to schlep it everywhere, and even the one book was an incredibly heavy addition to my framepack) this book in inextricably entwined in my mind with this trip, for which alone I will always remember it vividly. And yes, my rate of consumption was ...

... down for the night. Some people were sleeping on the deck. There was a pool, which people were using already and a Ala carte restaurant and a Self service one. Dan and I got a drink and claimed a seating area and a few other found us until we had 8 chairs or so. We were almost too afraid to get up in fear of losing them! We went in shifts to have dinner at the self service restaurant. We went around 7.30pm and had tortelli ...

... the coastal resorts in August - the idea of travelling somewhere quiet and undiscovered was very appealing.
We passed very few cars on the journey to Matera, which was actually rather refreshing having spent last summer trying to get away from the over-crowded tourist resorts.

As the road headed up to the mountains, we passed ancient hilltop towns and villages clinging to rocky limestone plateaus. Often seeming more Greek ...

... 15 hour boat ride.

We boarded the ferry and set off. Of course on our grocery run we bought some beer and wine, so we began the drinking on the top deck. After a while we had quite the crew: the Australian couple, the 3 Spokane guys, and then 4 Irish lads. We stayed up late drinking and talking under the stars...it was pretty cool.

Then we went to bed. On this ferry ...

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.

... hoffen :-) Tatsaechlich finden wir in Bari sofort eine Bank und auch einen Bus zum Hafen. Dort lernen wir direkt ein paar unserer Mitfahrer auf der Faehre kennen und verbringen die Busfahrt damit, uns gegenseitig und wahrscheinlich erst recht den Fahrer verrueckt zu machen, an welcher Haltestelle wir wohl raus muessen... "This one?" Die ersten steigen aus... "No, the next one." --- Naechster Halt: "It must be this ...

... driveway down to a soccer field and basketball court. This driveway continued for about a quarter mile before it led to our hotel. The hotel was situated behind a bunch of sports fields and next door to a junior high or high school. What a random location for a hotel! The hotel itself was also the most random hotel we'd ever been to. It looked like a school dormitory, complete with a mess hall on the second floor and a ...

Since I last wrote, I feel like I have been doing laps of Italy! In four days I drove down to the bottom of the east coast, along the south coast, and up the west coast to Sorrento (pretty much half-way around Italy!!). I have however, seen some gorgeous places, met a few more cheeky men, and also been made aware of some more road rules for driving in Italy...... 1. There are only two speeds - 20km p/hour or 200km/hour. 2. When overtaking, despite ...

29.7.06 The Sistine Chapel we didn't see. It was hot, humid and steamy in Rome but we had to make another trip into town to buy maps for the Asian countries we plan to enter. (The maps we have from Australia are not comprehensive enough and we should have spent more time getting better maps in our own country or Great Britain, so the information is all in English) We thought we'd make an early start to the Sistine Chapel with the first shuttle bus from the Camp Ground leaving ...