Alberobello (Truilli Town)

Our first stop back in Western Europe again - great to be back to the relative normality of southern Italy a place that most Europeans tend consider fairly 'extreme', a great first stop for us however to ease into Italy. Having arrived at Bari we quickly headed out of the city, it's really one of those places which even waiting for a ferry to can seem like too long to dwell here for. Heading up from the coast to Alberobello was magic, the road winds up a plateau away from the coast and the ridge is lined with the typical postcard perfect Italian villas. Another amazing thing was the clarity of the air as we'd only

just left the plumes of Balkan forest fires that enveloped the region, I guess we kind became accustomed to it there but now it meant that we had a clear view to the sea.

As we approached Alberobello we found signs of what we'd been drawn here for, the truly amazing truilli buildings!

Truillitown!

truly impressive vista

Truilli tops

and more Truilli tops

These circular roofed houses were originally built entirely without mortar, the idea was that if the taxman came along demanding his dwelling tax, they could quietly dismantle them into a pile of untaxable rubble. A very picturesque town with

very picturesque buildings that aside from the humble dwelling place have been turned into every imaginable use - churches, doctors surgeries, shops, museums, although most of the truillis that we saw were rammed with an odd assortment of tacky tourist souvenirs seemingly unrelated to the truillis at all.

Truest of churches?

Truth is it's just a house

another truly lovely house

True, a truilli vineyard!

Trulli streets

OK so the truth of the matter is that the truilli jokes did begin to wear a little thin, fortunately we had Natalie to pick up from the Brindisi airport the next day so someone new to replay our truely silly jokes on. Sorry Nats! Natalie flew from New Zealand via a stop in London to tour southern Italy with us for the next 10 days

Natalie and Sharon at the truly magnificent sunset ;)

Humm truly interesting construction technique

Truly in ruins

It was a great place to hang out and catch up with Natalie, a fine campground with a big pool and not to crowded. A far cry from the modest 'campgrounds' of the Balkans and Eastern Europe.

Little did we know that as it wasn't on the coast it had also missed the mid season madness which meant that most other accommodation in the south of Italy was fully booked til the end of August! From here onward we struggled to find a place to park for the night, having to compete with all 60 million holidaying Italians, all of which seemed to be holidaying in the south.

EH