Running for Your Life: Puglia Puglia

It’s been about a month since being in Puglia (Apulia, in English), but the magic of the land, the light, the air stirs within me still. That is saying something, given the month of tragic headline news we've had back in America.

M and I never fully grew accustomed to where we were living: a masseria, or fortress farm, built in the early 1700s and renovated three centuries later. (In the vein of receiving a phone call from the Pulitzer committee – My response: Are you sure you have the right Larry O’Connor? Chances are …)

No, our two-week masseria, with a late eighteenth-century fresco in the farm’s former chapel (now drawing room) was not meant for someone more deserving. It was for us. Two writers who didn’t know how much we could take advantage of a sanctuary retreat like this one.

Inside the fortress farm: courtyard piazza, converted cow barn (with feeding station plaques and birthdates for three cows who lived there – Contessa, Principessa and Bianchina) to game room, where M spread out her latest novel manuscript on the netless ping pong table; a cheese room with vintage fireplace; second story sleeping quarters, with back deck for night sky watching. The door leading upstairs has a lock on it so old that it has to be turned with a metal key the size and weight of a small dog.

Puglia, in southern Italy, is not on the tourist trail. In the hills where we stayed, it is a place of sunny days and cool nights. Lemon and orange trees. Olives and capers and cherries and almonds. Primitivo red wine made with the grape that when it migrated to Napa Valley put Zinfandel on the map. But Primitivo in the terroir that is Puglia Puglia tastes nothing like the food clobberer that is California Zinfandel.

Looking for an Italy that is not Venice, not Florence, not Rome, not Tuscany, not Umbria? Consider Puglia Puglia. It will stay in your blood long after you leave it.

Next: Running for Your Life: Puglia Poetry