Enjoy your stay in Puglia!

Guided Visits:
Matera (morning, half day)
Cisternino, Ostuni and Martina Franca (full day)
Lecce’s historical centre di Leuca (morning, half day) half day)
Galatina and the Taranta history (morning, half day)
Adriatic and Ionian sea: Otranto, Castro and S. Maria di Leuca (full day)

Tastings:
Wine tastings, in local ancient wineries (Negroamaro, Primitive, etc.)
Olive oil tastings, in farmhouse or limestone mill
Cheese tastings, in farmhouse (mozzarella, scamorze, giuncata)
Bread tasting, in famous Altamura’s bakeries
Meat tastings, in local “fornello” (best meat grilled before your eyes)
Ice creams tasting, in famous Lecce’s ice cream parlour

Special meals:
Vegetarian meal, in farmhouse
Typical cuisine, at the local trattoria
Seafood dinners

Special experiences:
Truffle Hunting
Cooking lessons
Diving (Porto Cesareo, Leuca, etc.)

Truffles for everybody

"SALENTO TRUFFLES”

Truffle’s Festival at Corigliano d’Otranto (Lecce, Puglia, Italy)

2nd edition jun 20 - 29 2008

A ten days event fully dedicated to the famous fungus of which Salento’s woods and fields are rich, both white and black variety.

Town festivals

Celebrations, town festivals and religious rituals fascinate every year many locals and foreigners. This area has managed to preserve local traditions and maintain cultural events throughout the years. Each village has a different celebration in honour of the Saint Patron. Wonderful decorations made of unique lighting impress visitors. Long galleries made of thousands and thousands of small coloured light bulbs are placed according to old techniques together with enchanting fireworks and products such as cupeta (sweet made of almond, honey and sugar) and scapece (fish, vinegar, bread and saffron) prepared according to the old traditional recipes.

Pizzica pizzica dance

The Pizzica pizzica (pinch) is a dance and a musical genre with a frenetic rhythm that was once linked closely to the phenomenon of Tarantismo. It was believed that some people, most often women, who demonstrated various recurring psychological symptoms (not epilepsy), had been bitten by a taranta, a mysterious spider whose existence has never been proved. These women could be cured, at least temporarily, by music with a frenetic rhythm, the Pizzica pizzica, that sent them into a trance, dancing to exhaustion and performing actions such as attacking people dressed in a particular colour. After a period when the Pizzica pizzica was being isolated, because it was considered an element of cultural backwardness and for this reason reserved for the outcasts of society, beginning in the 1970s the musical style was rediscovered and now it is the most popular dance rhythm of the young and a big international festival is organized every year in Melpignano.