In Italy what the road atlas seems to show should be treated with caution. Not because they are inaccurate but because the most direct route is rarely the quickest and all journey planning needs to factor-in how emotionally robust the driver is feeling. For example, today we travelled from Gallipoli to Matera, on paper a straightforward route, take the coast road we cycled down yesterday to Manduria then join the main road to Taranto, turn inland to Matera. However, most of these roads are not dual carriageways and in an attempt to suppress Italians' natural urge to drive like maniacs even main roads can have long sections with speed limits of 70kph or even 50kph. This explains why the both the Tom Tom and Google maps recommended the somewhat longer route on dual carriageways via Lecce and Brindisi, a few kilometres further but quicker by almost half an hour.
At least on a dual carriageway all the insane drivers are going in the same direction, well mostly, but this doesn't mean the road is hazard free. The Italian motorway network is as good as any in Europe but this is not the case with major trunk roads. They are potholed, crumbling, badly signed, with frequent roadworks, lanes closures and badly designed contraflows.
Italy is a mountainous country and when its major roads were upgraded half a century ago hundreds of tunnels and viaducts were constructed. The tunnels are fine but many of the bridges are falling apart, monuments to the country's infamously corrupt construction sector. In New Zealand when traffic merges signs instruct drivers to 'zip in turn'. Taking turns is an alien concept to Italians. If you observe them in conversation it usually involves a huddle of people talking simultaneously. It works ok in most situations, but not when road repairs require two lanes of traffic to merge. This always involves a death defying miracle at the last moment. No wonder the habit of going to Mass still persists here, I imagine driving becomes less stressful if you have faith in divine providence.
As we headed west from Brindisi towards Taranto we passed a sign on the side of a factory - 'Ranieri' in big blocky letters. We've driven down here before, I realised. This happens to me quite a lot, which is unsurprising given just how many European roads we have travelled over the past eight years. It's never a spectacular view or iconic building that prompts my memory, always a little detail, like a particularly tricky junction or some random signage. In this case there was some logic to the 'I remember Ranieri' moment. The sign stayed with me because back in 2015 lots of Italians were very excited by how well Leicester City were doing and insisted on telling me. It was a different era - all of them were flummoxed about how to pronounce 'Leicester'. What that reveals is 'La Gazzetta dello Sport, still reigned supreme, they had read about Leicester's winning streak but had never heard anyone actually say the name of the team. Like everyone else I guess they just scroll through video clips on their phone these days. They probably still can't say 'Leicester' but that's because the team has tanked and no longer has an Italian manager. However, because of Conté, I bet their pronunciation of Tottenham is 'perfecto'.
So random thoughts drift through my head as we travel along. Usually I keep them to myself, but sometimes share them. It's little wonder the co-pilot, post lunch, tends to drop-off. Rarely in Italy however, and the extra pair of eyes on the road is much appreciated.
Taranto's industrial sprawl appears on the horizon well before you reach the place. When we passed this way previously I likened it to Middlesbrough; from a distance it is oddly reminiscent of the view you get of Teesside when you drive south down the A19. There is one big difference, Teesside is seemingly in terminal decline, the most significant event there recently being the spectacular demolition of Redcar steelwork's defunct blast furnaces. Taranto seems to be thriving. We passed two huge sheds, I cannot recall ever having seen bigger industrial buildings. Gill checked Google maps, it seems the place specialised in metal fabrication. We are not talking widgets here, but massive structures, big girders for bridges or an oil tanker's superstructure maybe.
We turned north, always a wrench, especially when the sign the other way reads 'Reggio C', one short ferry hop and then we would be in Sicily. Next year, we agreed. The road to Matera follows the Via Appia, the Roman road to Brindisi and the East. Most of it has been obliterated by a modern dual carriageway, but a two way section, arrow straight across dun coloured undulating fields was unmistakably a Roman highway. Back then was it edged like now by an avenue of umbrella pines, we wondered.
As for the landscape, yet again it assumed a distinctly Iberian look, the big brown fields dotted with dusty looking farms and clumps of ragged trees reminiscent the plains of Castillon-Leon. Though not on such an epic scale, ten minutes later the prospect was more craggy, but just as arid looking.
Area Camper Matera is about 3km south of Matera alongside the old Via Appia. It gets positive reviews, people praising the friendly family who run it, as well as the free shuttle service to Matera and the fact that every guest is presented with a fresh loaf of locally baked bread. It was all true, the bread was locally baked and excellent.
Matera is one of those places that tourists know from photographs and articles even before they visit the place. I struggle to think of another destination in Europe which has gone from infamous to famous in quite the same way, apart from Palermo maybe.
In an article from 2019 travel writer Olivia Rawes observed:
As one of the oldest continually inhabited cities on earth, the city is characterised by a maze-like network of ancient cave dwellings - sassi - that have been inhabited since the Paleolithic era. Less than 70 years ago, around 15,000 people were still living in these caves; large families and their livestock squeezed together in dark dwellings with no natural light, electricity or water. Matera was overcrowded, riddled with disease and crippled by poverty. In 1945 Carlo Levi's book Christ Stopped at Eboli threw light on life in Matera and a wave of political attention followed: the Italian Prime Minister denounced it as the "shame of Italy" and a mass evacuation of the sassi took place, leaving a vast abandoned city in its wake.
After decades of neglect Matera's troglodyte slums began to be reinvented in the 1980s; restored and with electricity and plumbing connected, from the millennium onwards the 'sassi' became unlikely tourist attractions, first as novelties, then, as the budget airline/Airbnb short-break boom took-off, the town's cave-houses became a fashionable, if eccentric self-catering destination.
What most travel writers fail to mention is that the ancient heart of the Matera has coexisted with a more modern and much larger city that has developed alongside it over the past 150 years or so. So what Olivia Raws calls a 'mass evacuation" was more like a planned, but enforced relocation to purpose built flats in the modern city. Not so very different in fact to the slum clearance of the Gorbals or the fate of 'category D' villages in the Durham coalfield. However, I guess the troglodyte aspect of the Matera story gives it a unique resonance.
In photographs the historic centre looks similar to one of Italy's many iconic hilltop citadels, like Orvieto, Cortona or Volterra. The question that strikes the visitor as they approach Matera is, 'where is it?' Though Area Camper Matera is close to the town and located on a hillside, the old city is nowhere to be be seen. As the sosta's shuttle bus reached the outskirts the place looked very ordinary, a typical non-descript provincial city with traffic choked streets. It did give us an opportunity to observe Italian urban driving first hand as our driver zigzagged swiftly through the traffic At every near miss he gave a quick two peeps on the horn and shouted, 'Italia!' It struck me that I had misunderstood Italian driving habits all along; what I had taken as individualism - a stylish nonchalance towards personal safety - was actually a collective expression of national solidarity, a patriotic imperative.
The driver dropped us off opposite the bus station agreeing to collect us at 5.00pm. Our plan was to have lunch then explore the city. Reviewers on Google were very happy indeed about 'Street Food Il Rusticone's' pizzas and puccia, so we decided to head there. Matera still looked very underwhelming, we crossed a big square - Piazza Vittoria Veneto. It was quite handsome, but similar to hundreds of others in Italy. It's only unique feature was an odd spindly legged elephant sculpture inspired by Salvador Dali, a legacy of Matera's stint as European city of culture in 2019.
Il Rusticone was nearby on Via San Bagio. The place's much praised pizzas were only available in the evening, we settled for a couple of puccia instead. We didn't feel we had missed out because they were very good indeed.
The wall next to us had been used as a chalk board and was covered in customer comments. We fully concurred with this one:
The vibe of Il Rusticone was as memorable as the food. The serving staff were super friendly and helpful, and at lunchtime the place assumed the infectious buzzy theatricality that occurs when you get a gaggle of peckish Italians confronted by an inviting menu.
After lunch we carried on up Via San Bagio which became ever steeper and more medieval looking and no wider than an alley as we neared the top. There was still no sign of the spectacular ancient city depicted on the postcards and prints for sale in the gift shops we had passed.
At the brow of the hill the road forked, to the left a bland street of apartment blocks of indeterminate age with some newly built swanky ones at the end, to the left a big church with a terrace next to it. A miniscule sign of a walking man suggested this might be the way to go. At end of the terrace, beyond the bulk of the church we were confronted unexpectedly by this:
The iconic view of Matera, it was like a conjuring trick, a white rabbit out of the hat, all the more delightful because of the strenuous climb; we had worked for it.
It also became clear why Matera is a little diffident about revealing its charms. On photos the place looks like a hilltop settlement, in fact it occupies two sides of a steep limestone gorge.
This means that from a distance the ancient settlement must have been almost invisible; even more so latterly, as the modern city occupies the area around the lip of the canyon masking the substantial 'centro storico' completely.
To the left of the citadel's pyramidal stack the bare rocks and the precipitous sides of the spectacular gorge carved by Torrente Gravina are almost as impressive as the city itself. The rock face is pock-marked by dozens of caves. People have lived here for 9000 years making Matera the third oldest continuously inhabited settlement after Aleppo and Jericho. That is well over 2000 generations stretching from flint axe wielding neolithic hunters to iPhone touting tourists.
We had a choice. Either climb up the steep slope opposite and head for the cathedral perched on the clifftop, or skirt around the back of the settlement on a less challenging road which would take us back to the piazza with the Dali elephant. We opted for the latter which took us past a few of the famous troglodyte houses. Halfway around we wondered if we had made the right choice, the streets in the upper part of the town looked more interesting.
So we headed up a narrow alley. It was hard going, so easy to take the wrong turning and end up in a cul-de-sac, up roughly cobbled slopes alternating with uneven slippy steps; definitely not the place for someone with an impending appointment with a consultant osteopath! We took it slowly, and eventually reached the piazza next to the cathedral.
It dates from the mid thirteenth century. In the north you would find an a gothic building; this far south other influences prevail - Byzantine and Islamic.
The exquisite decoration around the doors and windows leans to the east, taking delight in a lithe line and abstract patterns.
I was struck by the peculiar dichotomy between the sophistication of the decoration and the primitivism of the figures, a delightful mix of north, south, east and west - an entire compass of influences!
Compared to the rest of Matera the buildings around the cathedral are somewhat grandiose. Next to the church is the bishop's palace, now used as the diocesan archive. The Palazzo Gattini next door has become a swanky hotel. Formerly it was the residence of Count Gattini, one of Matera's leading aristocratic families. Bishops and aristocrats at the top, the poor living in caves at the bottom, the place is like a feudal pyramid petrified.
These days you can opt to live like an aristocrat in Palazzo Gattini (£248 per night), or slum it like a serf in one of the troglodyte dwellings down in the 'Sassi,' available these days as bijou self catering accommodation on Airbnb for around £100 per night. In truth you would not actually be slumming it, the one I looked at had a bath the size of a plunge pool and decor that exuded a candlelit 'wellness' vibe. I can't decide of this was a welcome sign of progress or a depressing symptom of how the heritage industry commodifies the past - a bit of both probably.
We had a macchiato sitting at the tables in front of the Palazzo Gattini, they were no better or worse than anywhere else but the waiter sported a very classy waxed moustache, I guess that elevated the experience a little.
We've got into a sandwich/coffee/gelato habit in the middle of the day, so having ticked off first two we were delighted to happen upon the 'Creme Bureau' as we headed down Via Delle Beccherie towards the lower town.
The place scored 4.7 from Google reviewers, the best in town. Very good but not outstanding was our verdict
Soon we found ourselves back in Piazza Vittorio Veneto with an hour or so until we had to catch the bus back to the sosta. One of the main concentration of troglodyte houses lies below the eastern side of the square so we headed down. It i
wasl ike entering a nether world, a jumble of roughly hewn buildings cut into the bare rock.
Before it was evacuated in 1952 the sassi lacked drainage, access to fresh water or electricity. In depths of winter the conditions must have been hellish. That it has been transformed into a fashionable holiday destination on the face of it seems odd, until you consider all other sites of human misery and disaster that have become visitor attractions - the battlefields of Flanders, the Irish Famine memorials, Gettysburg, the Belfast murals. At least with Matera gastronomy is better, you can eat well while considering the depths of human misery. The irony of this is a tad discomforting.
Scattered among the troglodyte dwellings are rock churches, many with Byzantine sytle murals. These too are popular tourist attractions, but one afternoon is not enough time to see everything.
So I was pleased to happen upon one cave with fragments of fresco a few metres from Piazza Vittorio Veneto.
By now it was late afternoon, we had been on the go for hours, it was a relief to head back for the minibus. Matera had proved far more intriguing than I expected. It is a fascinating place. I read an article that mentions that it has Italy's fastest growing urban economy, which has to be good news for the Basilicata region which remains the country's poorest. What is great about the place is there is much more to it than a simple tourist trap. The university of Basilicata has a presence here, creating a youthful vibe. In a sense the way the ancient heart of Matera is almost hidden within the sprawl of the modern city seems apt. Past and present co-exist, the place is vivacious, not some 'living museum'. We liked it.
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