It's a helluva day at sea, sir!!

The elevation map for Alberobello to Ostuni showed us that the day would be mostly downhill, and the distance was about 28 miles versus the 44 we did the day before, so we set out feeling like we had all the time in the world. We decided to stop at the first little town, Martina Franca, for caffé (espresso) and pastry. The thing with Italians though is that they like to build their cities on the tops of hills. We climbed up to Martina Franca and biked into the main square. The waiters at the little cafe were not impressed with our lack of Italian. I tried the little local pastry, bocconotto, which looked like a little pie filled with fruit and cream - very tasty!

We shipped back down the mountain after our break and set off for the next town, Locoratundo (which I kept calling Boca Raton), which was sitting off in the distance on top of, you guessed it, another giant hill. All about the aesthetics in this place. When we got to what we thought was the vineyard, the man explained that we were actually at the direct sales part of the vineyard and the
tasting area was down the road, but it was closed. We couldn't believe him, so we hiked down to the vineyard only to find it was closed on Mondays! And now with our delay at the vineyard, we have missed the witching hour of 1pm and everything in town is shuttered and closed.

Thinking, very erroneously, that maybe something would be open in the next town of Cisterno, we headed there after speeding out of Locaratundo and spotting Cisterno gleaming in the distance, high on a mountain. At that point we realized lunch was not happening and we parked it on the side of the road to eat our Clif bars and make the push to Ostuni. 

Although ultimately Ostuni is technically well below Alberobello in elevation, it is important to note


that all of roads climb up and down giant hills through small towns. We did spend the day mostly on little side roads with very few cars and beautiful vineyards and olive groves all day. The day was sunny, but partly cloudy, so we weren't too hot.

We came out of the country roads onto a bigger road overlooking the sea and it was glorious. Ostuni isn't actually on the water, but it's up on a hill (of course) overlooking the sea.

We made it to our hotel after a little bit of a wrong turn in town - another nice place very close to the action. It had the most insane staircase though - made out of glass!!! So from the third floor, you have to step out onto a clear platform that looks down to the ground floor! It was terrifying! I jumped out to grab the railing and almost broke my ankle because I couldn't tell where the actual ground was, nor see any of the steps as I went down. Only recommended for the sturdy of heart.

We went out into the historical center (every town seems to have a Piazza Cathedrale or Piazza
Duomo or Piazza Plebiscitas - not sure what the last one means), and started the hunt for food - cibo!!
Per favore!! We are learning that not only does everything close at 1, but it doesn't open again until 6-8pm!! So when you arrive in a town starving and dirty at 4pm, you are out of luck.

We did eventually find a cute place that serves pastries - the Italians and their sweets!! you cannot get a sandwich but you can always get a cookie and a piece of cake! - allora, we had very low expectations as it looked like a really touristy  kind of place. I got a glass of prosecco with strawberries in it (divine), Nancy got a blue Mai Tai (bizarre - left mostly untouched), but then, BUT THEN, we got a plate of salami and cheese, bruschetta and a banana split. One of our fellow travelers came up to say hi and was sort of horrified at the pile of food we were eating to tide us over for our real dinner planned for 8pm. Whatever, Gary! The salami and cheese tray would probably cost about $60 to put together at Surdyk's and it was about €8.

Nancy made reservations at the best place in town earlier in the day - we figured if we couldn't eat lunch, we could at do dinner up. We ate at Porta Nova, at one of the gates to the city (Porta means door) with a panoramic open air view of the ocean and the valley below. We had Negroamaro wine and scallops on black rice, seafood in tomato sauce and lobster risotto - we topped it off with a cannoli. I don't usually eat dessert, but I can't pass up a cannoli. The view was amazing, the company was even better 😉 We got all dressed up and bumped into another couple on this trip that didn't recognize us, having never seen me out of pigtails and wearing make up.

The place was beautiful and decorated eccentrically with vintage scooters. The owner was wearing red eyeglasses, a yellow dress and bright blue high top sneakers - she kept two albino Mexican salamanders in a big bowl of water on the front desk. Not the most appetizing first impression, but definitely unique.

All in all, a really great day - we've been joking about one of our waiters at a café the other day. His English was a million times better then my Italian, but he snuck up behind me to get my order, standing really close  and quietly said to me, "Tell me.". I've never had anyone ask for my order that way, but we can't stop saying it to each other.

Also, I made my first joke in Italian!! When we were marching up the hill in Alberobello with all of our luggage after biking all day and starving and sweating, the tiny hotel receptionist leading the way looked back at me and I said, "Lavoriamo!". - meaning 'We work!' - and she laughed and nodded (but still didn't really help with the bags). I was fairly pleased with myself.