Matera, Matera, a truly unique place in the world. You might have seen it in movies like the opening of No Time to Die, or The Passion of Christ, a town of caves, where the poorest of the poor lived in those caves up until the 1950's. At one time known as "the shame" of Italy, it is now a jewel in it's crown.
In preparation for being there, I read Christ stopped at Eboli the week before we arrived. The old, uninhabited parts of the city gave me a feel for what it must have been like when Carlo Levi was a political exile, banished to Aliano, a nearby village, where he was forced to live for almost two years. I was very curious to see this place, and to stay in a cave. But first, we had to drive there. We picked up our rental and after a few wrong turns, we were on the road, headed to lunch in Altamura. We had read about Pein Assutt, which had great reviews, and thought we'd lunch there. Once we manuevered the town, found a parking place, and then found the restaurant, we discovered they were fully booked, but the owner took pity on us and told the server to seat us in the cantina, not the cool pull up a seat at the bar kind of seat you'd think of in the USA, but the literal cantina which translates cellar. They set a table up right outside the kitchen door and we had one of the best meals of the trip.
So cool they fit us in. Then, off to Matera, where I had booked a parking place, as you can't drive into the city, so you park and they take you in a van to the closest spot to your hotel. We didn't know how lucky we were until we saw many of the hotels had to be accessed by steep stairs.
We checked into our cave, a beautifully appointed room lacking one thing, a private toilet space. While I know some of you might be like, what's the big deal, but that's one place we both want our privacy. We made it work, but the rest of the trip our joke was "as long as there's a door on the bathroom, we're happy."
Our first full day we took a tour with a local. He knew so much history of this town, called the Sassi, including showing us the cave his father's family lived in until 1953, when the government started moving inhabitants into apartment buildings. (Look up the Marshall Plan, it played a large part in helping Italy shore up this part of their country.)
We learned that the animals lived inside with the people. The donkey and the two or three sheep would live in the back of the cave at night, then the family, with parents in a bed, two or three little ones in bed with them and bigger kids sleeping on the table or the chest most families had for storage. (How did they ever get pregnant to begin with?) Then the chickens slept under the bed. Can you even imagine? Me neither. Our second day in the city, we roamed around, toured a cave set up as the last family who lived there would have had it set up.
Then we went into the Chiesa di Santa Maria De Idris, a church in a cave, perched up high on a rock.
There were some beautiful mosaics on the walls there, but pics were not allowed. You'll have to go see for yourself. Our last day, we hiked to the Saint Agnus cave church on the cliffs across the valley and at the top of the hill.
It was a challenging hike, having lived on flat land now for almost three years, but I rose to the challenge. (The day before, Steve ran that trail. Yeah, not me.)
It was a beautiful hike looking back over the city and seeing the whole Sassi from such a great advantage point.
And it was great to have a vigourous hike. Most days on our trip we walked 7-10 miles, but rarely had anything challenging, so I welcomed it.
The meals we had were delicious. The Puglia region was my favorite food region of the trip. Mushrooms in fava bean sauce, turnip greens in fava bean sauce, orecchetti, crispy peppers, grilled vegetables, chickpeas in many different ways, cauliflower soup, lasagna, along with great wines.
But then the wines in the whole country are delicious. Wait, but so is the food. Ah, Italy.
Next blog, the rest of Puglia. Until then my friends,
Peace and Joy,
Jane
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