Puglia
The heel of Italy trades the Amalfi Coast's vertical drama for something lower, older, and easier to live in -- whitewashed towns, olive groves that run to the horizon, and a sea that stays warm into October.
Puglia rewards the traveller who wants August without the crush: trulli estates and restored masserie, dinners in Ostuni and Lecce, and a coastline that still feels like a discovery. It is, quietly, the region we send people to first.
Where to stay in Puglia
5 houses we would book ourselves.
An olive-country estate above Ostuni, built for ten and the long Puglian lunch.
A big, bright Ostuni house for sixteen -- the one you book for the whole family.
A cliff-edge house on the Salento with 180-degree views straight down the coast.
A working estate on forty acres of regenerative farmland -- Puglia at its most rooted.
An oasis near Cannole for eight -- quiet, green, and gloriously off the map.