A Ride Into An Architectural Fairyland - Ostuni to Alberobello

It started raining during the night and was still raining as we ate breakfast. When we set out there was a break but it looked temporary. As it turned out, we began to see gaps in the clouds and it never did rain on us throughout our ride. The countryside was pleasantly rolling. The hills were just enough to keep things interesting. It is mixed agricultural land, olive orchards, grains, and vegetable plots.

At first we were seeing more examples of the funny little houses we started seeing the day before.



By and by we saw our first trullo, farm houses built with unmortared conical stone roofs.



As we rode north the trulli became increasingly frequent, sometimes there were large compounds of them.



In the meantime, we stopped for lunch in Cisternino, and we had guess what? Pizza! It was tasty, but more importantly, we discovered a Italian beer that was actually good ( we previously had held a poor opinion of Italian beers).



When we got to Alberobello we splurged on an expensive hotel to be near the old town center. Once upon a time, during the 15th century, farm buildings were not taxed, and trulli were farm buildings. Therefore, the Count GianGirolamo Acquaviva D'aragona decreed that all the houses of Alberobello would be trulli so that he could avoid paying taxes to the king of Naples. We had great time wandering around the trulli of Alberobello.



Tomorrow we will tour the caves of Castellana and then ride to Monopoli, where we will meet Marco, a friend of our friend Julia. Marco promises us a walking tour of Monopoli, and the best gellato in the world!