Nearing the End (of Puglia)

 We decamped early yesterday morning (we were wide awake because Tuesday night is glass recycling collection. 

Let me tell you about the rubbish system in this part of the world, because it is a helluva lot more complex than NZ, and we like to think we are leading the world in, well, environmental stuff.

This is the sign that was left for us in the apartment in Monopoli:


Read that through and make sure you understand the system, because it took us a couple of reads. 

Then in the kitchen there are 5 different coloured bins, corresponding to the sign above. They took up a lot of room in the kitchen!



We thought we had it sussed but then on the Tuesday night, we completely forgot to put the glass bin (green) out before we went drinking cocktails. And who can remember after that? But we were reminded rather abruptly when the glass collecting truck came past at 5:30!

We walked through the old town to catch the 9:30 train to Lecce - drifting along the coast. These towns are all relatively close and the train system is amazing.  Come on NZ!

We picked up a car in Lecce  - and I'm now officially the European Driver, manual car, right hand side of the road - owning it - thank goodness for my co-pilot giving me directions!

And our new residence is an apartment in a castle (of sorts) in the port of Tricasse - and it is all beyond gorgeous. 

Extensive sea views, perched high above the road with a series of stairs to the sea. It's absolutely perfect  - down where the cafes are, about 5 minutes walk away, there is even a little sand beach! We are swimming in the morning and the afternoon - there is an outside shower on the terasa, beautiful seating and gardens, a place to sit with a glass of wine... what more could you want?












Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Back in monopoli

Image
 We stayed here last year and I really enjoyed it, smallish old town, good food, bars, meandering little streets and walkways, surprising things behind big doors. I still like it, totally worth a visit. The weather was cooler again this morning, cool enough to send me back into my room to grab a long sleeved shirt, and even then I felt I needed to shelter from the wind.  Basilica Concattedrale di Maria Santissima della Madia is the name of this beautiful church but there are 18 others to choose from, including one which has depictions of death on the door, mummified administrators in the crypt and is a place to go and pray for those in limbo - it's a purgatory church. Today there were three weddings at the Basilica and honestly, we need to up our game in terms of wedding clothes. The prize went to the couple who both were a deep purple - his suit and her dress. Men were mostly in sneakers with their Italian suits, and it was all sparkle and gold for shoes for the women. It was...
Read more

Fated Roadie (sorry, this one is out of order!)

Image
Jenny and I decided that we would head to Trogir for the day - this combined with a wine tasting at Kairos Vineyards. The day was fated. We bought tickets for the bus to Trogir - it was leaving in 10 minutes and we planted ourselves in front of Peron 1 - and waited. The bus didn't appear, so I went to ask about whether it was late - 'no, it left at 10:30, not before not after'. 'Was it invisible' I asked? We were right there, only the bus didn't pull in to the Peron. Of course we had to pay for a new ticket for the next bus... We jumped into a taxi from the airport to Trogir - 'sure' he said, 'I can take you to the vineyard, call me 10 minutes before you need to go there'. He even called Kairos Vineyard to get directions. Jenny and I grabbed some fruit, and wandered into the old town. Only momentarily distracted by a dress shop, we stopped to ask a lady (Dijana) about the significance of the markings on the co...
Read more

Bikies - Part Two

Image
Because we didn't rent the scooters until 11 yesterday morning, we didn't need to return them until 11 this morning. What joy! Where else could these little wonders transport us? Well for a start we had to go to Jelsa, a harbour town about 10 minutes away to fill the tanks with benzine to return them. We set off at 8:30 in a bikie caravan - of sorts, or maybe just in our imagination. Certainly not grunting engines, more whining, but indulge us please. We were told that there were some beautiful beaches on the opposite side of the island, so having no real idea of where we would end up, we whined in and out of little villages - Chris, Nikki, Jack and Jenny on the same bike, and me. Checking the rudimentary map that we had found, we could see that there was another tunel, (you realise of course that I'm using the Croatian spelling - just in case you thought I couldn't spell - just thought it would flavour our experience for you) - just that this tunel was different ...
Read more