Relish the Healthy Mediterranean Cuisine
17 - 24 April 2021
Euros €2960

See full details below

Puglia a Spanish touch. Colours defining the different seasons, each one bringing with it special vegetables and Enjoy this Puglia wine and food tour in Bari, Alberobello area, Matera and Lecce. A strange feeling of antiquity, sharp colours and flavours of wild nature sorrounds Puglia. Dividing the Adriatic from the Ionian sea and connecting West to the East, Puglia was part of Magna Grecia, then of the Roman Empire who built there via Appia ending in Brindisi. Later of the Bourbons gave fruits together with mozzarella, burrata, olives and friselle with tomatoes, symbol of Mediterranean diet.

Through a taste of Primitivo di Manduria and Negroamaro wines you will understand the strenght of the land. In Salento, by the coast, a delicate taste of Rosè perfectly matches with light dishes and sunny days.  For so many centuries Puglia was conquered, now the beauty of the region is going to conquer you!

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Included in the price:
• 1 night in beautiful four star hotel, breakfast included in Bari center
• 4 nights in charming Masseria in Alberobello area
• 2 nights in deluxe five star hotel, breakfast included in Lecce center
• 2 hands-on cooking lessons with English assistance 
• 7 dinners (1 of which is after the cooking class) 
• 5 lunches (1 of which is after the cooking class) 
• all meals include selected regional wines, mineral water, coffee and digestivo
• guided tours of: Bari, Alberobello, Matera, Martina Franca, Lecce
• Olive tasting
• Visit to three wineries and tastings
• Visit to mozzarella producer with tasting 
• Visit to capocollo di Martina Franca producer and tasting

​• Our recipe book in English
​• Traditional Italian hand printed apron
• Private transfers on return from Lecce to Bari
• Private minivan with driver for all the excursions listed in the program
• Tour director English speaking throughout (Marcello or/and Raffaella)

Not included:
• Flight ticket
• Personal expenses
• Everything not written in the program
• Cancellation travel insurance (that we highly recommend)
• Local taxes (city taxes)

plan your tour

2021 Dates:-
17-24 April

Price Per Person
Euros 2960
based on double occupancy.
​Single supplement - Euros 350
​Plan Your Tour Today!
​
​Minimum of 6 participants.
​

• 1 night in Bari center
• 4 nights in charming Masseria
• 2 nights in deluxe hotel
• 2 hands-on cooking lessons
• 7 dinners
• 5 lunches
• all meals include wines
• guided tours
• And Much More! (see Itinerary)

​ITINERARY

Saturday – Arrival in Bari and a welcome dinner
 
Your beautiful hotel in the Bari city center will be our meeting point for the tour. In the late afternoon, we will gather in the lobby for a welcome aperitif inside the beautiful Italian cafe.
 
We'll enjoy traditional dishes for dinner at a classic trattoria in "Bari Vecchia," one of the oldest of the city.

Sunday – Tour of Bari, orecchiette, and a guided visit through Alberobello, great dinner 

Sunday morning will begin with a guided tour of this capital of the Puglia region. We'll watch women in the streets making strascinati and orecchiette, two typical pastas of the area. You'll be amazed at how fast they make these foods!
 
After our city tour, we will have lunch at a nearby café-pastry shop with tasting of local delicacies. We will then drive toward the Murgia area, close to Alberobello, where we will be staying for the next four nights at an enchanting countryside resort.
 
Once we have checked into our rooms, we will drive to Alberobello. This small town is the capital of Trulli (which are small, white buildings with conic roofs that are unique just to this region in Italy and are a UNESCO World Heritage Site). We will have a guided visit of the Trulli followed by dinner at an inviting restaurant in the area.

Monday – Cooking class at Masseria, visit Locorotondo and Fornello dinner in Cisternino

In the morning, a lady chef at our masseria will teach us how to make orecchiette and focaccia barese, typical of Puglia. We will then have lunch of what we have cooked together.  
Later in the afternoon, we will drive to Locorotondo, which is a jeweled hilltop town that is considered to have the best views of the Valley of Itria and Murgia.
 
Our day will end in Cisternino, another beautiful hill town with stunning views. We will indulge in the town's traditional dinner, which is held at the butcher shop with an annexed wooden oven. You will choose between "bombette", lamb, veal, or sausage that will be cooked "al Fornello" just for you. An experience you can only have in Cisternino!

Tuesday - Mozzarella making visit, wine tasting in Gioia del Colle,
 Matera vist, dinner
The morning will begin with a visit to a nearby cheese producer where we will get to see the interesting process of making fresh mozzarella, burrata and other cheeses. 
On our way to Matera we stop in Gioia del Colle at a terrific family winery to taste the local Primitivo red indigenous wine. We will have a great lunch at the winery with the family.

We will arrive in Matera in the early afternoon. This city is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is located in the Basilicata region that borders Puglia. The Sassi district is the ancient heart of this city and still has existing prehistoric dwellings from thousands of years ago that are carved out of the face of the calcareous rock. We will take a tour of the Sassi with an English-speaking guide to learn more about these fascinating dwellings.

​Dinner will be served in Matera at a charming restaurant. Here we will enjoy food with different flavors that belong to the Basilicata region. After dinner, we will return to our hotel.​

Wednesday – Martina Franca visit, Capocollo tasting and lunch,​ tour Monopoli, and enjoy a fish dinner in Polignano
Wednesday morning will begin with a drive toward the elegant little town of Martina Franca with an English-speaking guide where we will learn about the town's baroque architecture.

We'll visit one of the producers of the town's famous "Capocollo di Martina Franca," salume that is lightly smoked with local herbs, and enjoy other specialties there for lunch.

We'll return to our hotel for a rest.

In the late afternoon drive toward the coast for a nice stroll through the pretty town of Monopoli. Soon after, we will drive toward the enchanting seaside town of Polignano, where Domenico Modugno -singer and author of the song "Volare"- was born, for a delicious fish dinner at an amazing restaurant.

Thursday – Visit Ostuni, a wine tasting, arrival in Lecce and enjoy a fish dinner

We will begin the day with a drive south to the Salento area, where Lecce is the most prominent city. We will make a stop in Ostuni, known as "the white town," that is a gleaming white hilltop city with sun-bleached streets and cobbled alleyways. We'll continue on toward Brindisi, where we will visit a winery for a tasting of Negroamaro red wine, followed by a light lunch.
 
We will arrive in Lecce after lunch. Our deluxe hotel in Lecce is located in the heart of the city and we will stay here for the remaining two nights of our tour.
 
In the late afternoon, after we have settled into the hotel, we will enjoy aperitif in the Lecce city center followed by a delicious fish dinner.

This night you will get to sleep at a beautiful five-star hotel.

Friday – Guided visit of Lecce, a cooking class and farewell dinner

Friday morning we will meet our guide for a walking tour of Lecce. This lively university town is considered one of the most interesting cities in the region for its typical seventeenth century architecture. It is often called the Florence of the South for its monuments, mansions, and ornate buildings.
After the visit we have some free time when you can enjoy shopping and strolling in the lively city center. You'll have lunch on your own during this time.
 
In the afternoon, we will have one last cooking class where we will create local specialties that we will delight in for our farewell dinner. 

Saturday – Departure Day
Departure after breakfast at the hotel.

plan your tour

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I just returned from a week in Puglia with Marcello and his daughter, Francesca. We began in Bari, an interesting seaside city that is both modern & upscale as well as historical. The Petrocelli Theater there is magnificent. We continued on to the Alberobello region where Trulli style buildings, white washed with conical, stone roofs dominate. It is a UNESCO Heritage site and well worth the honor. Along the way we ate wonderful meals in places Italians go, with wines aplenty. We visited wineries, a cheese making facility, a fabulous bakery whose products I am still enjoying, trying to spread out the pleasure. We visited Matera, an area of cave homes and another UNESCO site. One side of the valley is preserved as it was, and the other has been developed into restaurants, bars, businesses built above and around the caves. We continued on to Lecce where most of the architecture is Baroque. There are also some Roman ruins, fabulous churches, and modern shopping. It, too is a UNESCO site. We had a cooking lesson at the home of a well known cook and teacher who was featured in the Sunday NYTimes just a week before our trip. The hotels were lovely, the food was great, and, most of all, our host and hostess were caring, knowledgeable and delightful. We were a group of seven, and four of us had traveled with Bluone on previous trips.

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I generally prefer independent travel to tours; in fact, my idea of hell is a bus trip with 60 people and being herded in and out of places with no time to really see anything. Touring with Bluone is the exact opposite! Small group (there were 11 of us) with Marcello and Raffaella taking the time to make sure that everyone was enjoying themselves at all times. This was my first trip to Puglia, and it is a beautiful part of Italy. We started in Bari, spent several days in and around Alberobello, then ended in Lecce. From the minute we arrived, I knew I was on a first class trip! We ate, and ate, then ate some more, all the while learning about the food in the region, how it is grown and how it is prepared. For me, one of the highlights of the trip was Matera...I definitely want to spend more time in this amazing town. As I said, I usually travel on my own, and am usually the planner for the trip. I have to say it was really nice to not have to worry about how we were getting from point A to point B, when and where to meet local guides (after hours of research to find one!) and when and where to eat. Everything was beautifully organized, and there was plenty of down town for independent wandering. Can't say enough about how much fun Marcello and Raffaella are to travel with!

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