Locorotondo: Sat Sept 3 – Tue Sept 6
Sunday 4th September: Day 3 of A’qto cycle tour: Cooking Class Day
It was a beautiful morning that greeted us for our first morning in Locorotondo. I headed out at 6am for a walk and managed to get out the gate this time. The area around our accommodation was picture-postcard beautiful, with rolling hills, renovated and unrenovated trulli buildings, vineyards and orchards. There was little road traffic, being a Sunday, making for a most delightful opportunity to experience this delightful region.
The riding group set off around 9 am but the non-riders didn’t depart until 10.15 am; it was rather nice to have a slow start to the day. Our activity for the day was a 3.5 hr cooking class run by Lucrezia Gallo, of https://cesarine.com, out of her home which was around a 10 drive from our accommodation. She was a lovely and gracious host who took us through the preparation of bread balls, a type of traditional, Italian peasant food but now popular in trendy restaurants, a tiramisu and orecchiette, a traditional Puglinese pasta. We had a lovely time chatting with her as we prepared the meals and greatly appreciated the privilege of being welcomed into her home for or this cooking class. She was very patient with us as we struggled to get the knack of rolling out the orecchiette so, this fact alone, would make me recommend her cooking class if you’re ever in the area. Should you ever meet Lucrezia ,do ask about her son’s progress in the Milan fashion world and ask to see his latest creations; likely worn by a glamorous young female who is quite popular on Instagram in this region!
It was about 2.30 pm by the time we finished enjoying the spoils of our cooking class and got back to our accommodation and the cyclists had arrived back by then too. It was another afternoon of leisure before heading in to Locorotondo for dinner at around 6pm.
We had a bit of an opportunity to look around the old town of Locorotondo before our aperitivo hour and we were quite impressed; its a very pretty place with lots of Instagram photo opportunities at almost every turn. Locorotondo is well worth a visit if you’re ever in this part of the world, even if just for a couple of hours to stroll around the old town and then have dinner; it’s worth seeing at night, if possible, as many of the restaurants and lanes are lit up with fairy lights making for a rather magical atmosphere.
Monday 5th September: Day 4 of A’qto cycle tour: Olive Oil + Ostuni
I started our second Locorotondo morning with another 6 am walk. What a difference a day makes. Even at this early hour there was a lot more traffic and a fair bit of me diving off to the side of the road, once into a rather thorny plant. I ended up taking slightly different route, to try and escape the cars, and discovered a delightful cluster of trulli homes: check the photos.
The cyclists were riding into Ostuni today and the non cyclists had a visit to an olive farm followed by a visit to Ostuni. The fortified Masseria Brancati olive farm we visited was just outside of Ostuni and about a 35 minute drive from our Locorotondo accommodation. I’d previously mentioned, in an Ostuni post, about being told of a 3,000 year old olive tree and, well, I finally got to see it. The Masseria was also home to a rather amazing underground ancient olive mill, that was also around 3,000 years old, and equally as impressive. Our group was able to spend time walking a section of the olive grove before inspecting the ancient mill and then tasting some of the Masseria’s olive oil.
During our guided tour I discovered that olives are harvested from Oct -Dec and the earlier Oct harvest, of green olives, produces a more bitter olive oil whilst the latter Dec harvest, of black olives, produces a less bitter oil. I also learned that ‘cold pressed’ means that the pressing instruments achieved no higher a temperature that 25 degrees and that the shelf life for olive oil is around 18 months to two years. It was a very interesting experience and I consider the Masseria to be well worth a visit if you’re ever in the Ostuni region.
Our group then took the short drive up to Ostuni and, as luck turned out, we met up with the cyclists in the main square at Ostuni and so we’re then able to have lunch together as a group. After that it was back to Locorotondo for both groups for some pool time before heading back into Locorotondo for dinner.
