5/27/19-5/29/19 Puglia, Italy: Brindisi and Lecce

Ken had a rough plan for an 8- to 10-day route around the coast of Puglia. We made it to Italy a week early, so we have plenty of time to stretch that out and relax. Looking forward to sunny days and white sand beaches!

Monday, 27 May 2019

Biked 3 miles from ferry port to B&B in Brindisi (disembarked with the semitrucks and rode out of the port with them; that was interesting!)
Accommodations: B&B Handy, hosts Luca and Francesca Manos, Via Cristoforo Colombo, 87. Booked through Airbnb. Very nice hosts. Stored our bikes in their own garage nearby. Small but very nice, newly renovated room on noisy, busy street at edge of old town.

Brindisi is an old port city. We had time to walk around and visit some of the historic sites, switch my phone to a new Italy SIM card, eat pizza, and plan our route to Lecce for the next day. It was chilly and rained lightly on and off during the day.

We found some interesting old architecture.

War memorial.

Tuesday, 28 May 2019

Biked 32 miles to Lecce, 263 feet of climb
Brindisi to Lecce along Coast Bike Route
Accommodations: House with garden, host Antonella, Vico degli Albanesi 4. Booked through Airbnb. Spacious old 1-bedroom apartment with full kitchen, washer, and private back garden, tucked behind a small church in old town. It seemed like the kind of place that might have been in the family for years--maybe a grandmother's apartment. Very quiet and cool.

Biking to Lecce was completely different from riding in Greece. First of all, it was FLAT! We started out on a small road that led through farm fields and became a dirt road, turned onto a larger tar road that wound around a closed coal plant and made its way to the seacoast, and finished on a small highway with a lot of traffic leading into Lecce.

Lecce is known as the Florence of the South because of its ornate Baroque architecture, twisty stone alleyways, and busy little piazzas. It is noisy and touristy during the day and in the main piazzas, but quiet and pleasant at night and in the residential alleys.

We spent the evening wandering around the old part of the city, eating, and exploring the cathedral, the basilica, and the old Roman coliseum.

Wartime bunkers were hiding in the grass near the small farm road outside Brindisi.

The small farm road turned into a dirt road. Our bikes handled the gravel well. Note: There are no mountains in sight!

Old Roman coliseum in Lecce.

Ken relaxing in the living room of our Lecce apartment. Most of our accommodations have been small rooms in hotels and guest houses. It was nice to stretch out in this three-room apartment with garden.

Wednesday, 29 May 2019

No biking, lots of walking
Accommodations: House with garden, night 2 of 2.

We scheduled two nights here to give ourselves a full day to do laundry and plan the rest of our time in Puglia. Our main need was to figure out how to get from Puglia (the southern tip of Italy) to Munich, with our bikes, by 16 June. Based on research before the trip, we thought we could take a train from Bari to Venice, spend a few days in Venice, and then take another train from Venice to Munich. When we tried to make the bookings, we discovered that we could not take the bikes on any train that crossed regional borders in Italy unless we boxed the bikes. Boxing the bikes means taking them apart, finding boxes, hauling the bikes around in the boxes to make connections within train stations, and booking minivan transfers between train stations and accommodations. After several hours of trying to find bike boxes, direct trains, accommodations in Venice, and minivan transfers, we were exhausted and frustrated--and we found that we couldn't actually book the tickets online and were not able to get through to an English-speaking agent to book on the phone. We explored renting a car--we could do it, but it would cost 1500 euros because of picking up in Italy and dropping off in Germany.

So we decided to take a walk and find gelato.

On the way to gelato, I spotted Crusi Viago, a travel agency. We don't usually work with travel agents because we actually like the process of planning and booking ourselves, but the agency in Meteora had given us such a nice solution to our transfer from Greece to Italy that we decided to try for some help with our new dilemma.

We asked the young agent to help us book trains for ourselves and our bikes to Munich. "Is not possible," he said. "Okay. How can we get to Munich, with our bikes, on 16 June?" we asked. "You fly. One flight a day. It leaves Brindisi at 8:40 am and arrives in Munich at 10:35 am. You want me to book it for 16 June?" he said. "Yes!" we said. Another 6-8 days of hard travel with bikes replaced by 2 hours of an easy transfer--this time by air.

Europe is not quite the same as it was 47-48 years ago. Trains and buses are being replaced by cars and planes. We can adapt!

Ken walking past a cafe near our apartment.

Cathedral in Lecce.

Inside courtyard of a museum in the cathedral complex.