Thursday 20 June

And……. .on the road again!   This time we walked a couple of hundred meters along the street to the station, waited for a local train which took us to a place called Monopoli (Pete couldn’t resist a photo op to send to his local watering hole in Nelson, that’s the owners’ name), then a change to another train to Polignano where Jacopo had offered the chance for a break in the journey and possibly a swim.  Good idea because they like to break up the journey if they can but actually in the heat didn’t really work for me and a couple of others.  We’re all used to the idea of a New Zealand or Australian beach with sand and plenty of room but the tiny Polignano beach was all stones and people – it looked crowded but apparently at times there’s not even room to move.   Also not everyone can put their swimming togs on at the start of the day and not need to go to the to the toilet until hours later, definitely not possible for me.  And where do you get towels?   Yes, it’s hot enough to dry off very quickly but still not really practical.   It also made me wonder about all those people on the beach, especially when it is mid-summer, where do they change etc – there are no toilets.   You could pay a fortune at the couple of beach clubs on the access path I guess.

Anyway, they had a good arrangement for us to leave our bags at a café a few minutes walk away so we all dragged bags and backpacks there (we had both, as did others).  I think it was another 15 minutes in the heat to the beach where two swam, Pete and some others dipped their toes in and said the water was perfect, and the rest of us just sat in the shade on the rocks and watched the sun-worshippers.   The water was that beautiful blue, we just don’t get that colour in NZ.  Some swimmers had umbrellas and built up little cairns of stones to keep them upright.   Pete and I trudged back up the hill, got a couple of good photos, then sweated slowly back to the café where we’d all pre-ordered focaccia pockets.   We were ready for them, and a cold lemon soda, then it was back to the station at 1.30 then on the way to Lecce where a driver was waiting at 3pm to take us to the hotel.

The Eos is a nicer hotel than in Trani, quite big rooms (bathroom is huge) and the aircon works perfectly (not cold-or-off like Trani), perhaps a bit tired and the bathroom not as clean but the bed was comfy and a good sleep matters.    We were able to have a spell until 5.30 then it was back out into 30+ heat for a 15-minute walk to the old town gate and an orientation wander around the old town.   First stop was the Roman amphitheatre in the middle of town, right by the main town square; small but in good condition it is used for small concerts and events so must be a great sight.   The town has the golden stone buildings we’ve become used to, rough stone pavers underfoot, several outdoor cafes and just a nice number of tourists, no crowding. 

Second stop was the Duomo, one of many churches in the town, a not-too-blingy church with very well preserved stone carvings on the outside.   The old town is not a big area, full of little lanes of course and a church around every corner.  

We had a 6.30pm appointment at the Faggiano Museum, having been told ‘this family was making plumbing repairs to their house, dug up the floor and found Roman remains.   The government wasn’t interested in helping with excavations so they did it themselves and made a museum’.   I expected a little old man or lady with a few cabinets of broken pottery.      Well, I couldn’t have been more wrong, this place was magic and the family member who showed us round, Andrea (son of the owner), spoke good English with a sense of humour and all ten of us were captivated right from the start. 

They had broken through the floor in 2001 to fix the pipes, tenants having complained of damp, and found a whole new complex of underground rooms, a 3m deep cistern used for water but also with a narrow upper slit used as an escape tunnel into the next house.    By law they had to do the excavations but under government supervision, decided to do it all themselves as there was no financial incentive other than a paid archaeologist on site every day, and over seven years uncovered history going back over 2500 years from the Messapi people through to 1000 to 1200 when this place was a Knights Templar home, and later, up to 1600 it was a Convent of Franciscan Nuns of Saint Clare's order.

The excavation work brought to light tombs, granary, cisterns, a well, Templar frescos, resting place for bones (the nuns), underground escape ways, and more than 5000 archaeological finds.   http://www.museofaggiano.it/en/home/   The Government has taken pretty much all of the finds for ‘study and analysis’ but there’s no real movement on them.  By law they should have been given 25% of the finds’ worth but that’s not forthcoming and Andrea said it’s not worth chasing because they’re actually making enough to cover costs now including further excavations into the house next door with three large rooms well on the way to being included (we went into these, normally the tours don’t go in yet as its not ready for display.    All the family participated over the 7 years including the youngest brother who was aged 12, tied to a rope and lowered into the more inaccessible areas ……. For some reason he doesn’t participate in the museum very much, just runs the family café which financed it all in the first place!   There are glass panels over some of the lower parts, grilles in other areas.     We saw a baby’s tomb, wall tomb, and he told us if a nun died they used to remove organs, hang the body over a deep hole (which we saw) for all the blood to run out, sit with it until the body dried out then added the bones to their ossuary. 

Trundling up onto the second floor we did see a few glass cases of broken ‘bits’, not dated, that they’ve been able to keep including several roman tear glasses which were used to capture the tears of people in mourning.    The main room (formerly a living room) showed the ceiling which had been scraped of plaster by the team and they found it was made of hollow terracotta jars, each about five inches across, cemented together – reason for this was it made the roof weight lighter and also the air inside absorbed heat.   And when we got on the roof you can see the domed shape.   Also up top we all had a go at being lookouts on the Templar lookout.  It looks like a little guard box underneath but it has an escape hatch in the floor (now covered by a trapdoor) and there are still the faint remains of the Templar triangle symbol and others on the back wall.  

And that’s not all!!!    Jacopo had promised us a surprise and he didn’t disappoint.   We were herded round the back of the museum building, originally part of the convent of course, and beside the old cloisters they’d laid out a heap of little snacks, drinks, fruit (including their own apricots picked just an hour before) so we had a very good grazing meal there.     Then the rest of the surprise was a performance of the local tarantella-style music with a dancer, it was unexpected and couldn’t have been better.  We went into one of the rooms off the cloisters, all stone walls and old (of course) and after an explanation about the dancing (only the dancing could stop the poison if you were bitten by a tarantula – and the romantic side of the dancing is that the man and woman never touch though they go close).   They started by asking us to just listen to the music, no photos yet, darkened the room and the beautiful young woman dancer sat quietly on the floor.  Then we got the loud drumbeats as he came into the room from an alcove followed by the other instruments joining in (another drum, flute, bagpipes, piano accordion), all very mysterious-sounding and we all thought very much like Irish music.    It was beautifully set up.   After that we saw some dancing then it was our turn, all up in a big circle ‘tramping the grapes’ and one by one pulled into the middle by either the man or woman and all had a turn at the tarantella.    Our Luana and her two boys were great, the Italian sense of rhythm definitely coming out there.    We couldn’t have asked for a better surprise for sure.

On the way home we stopped for a gelato of course, just to cool down, and sat outside the café in a cooler evening, very pleasant.