A few weeks ago, my family and I decided to take a trip to Puglia as one of my aunties lives there, near Bari.

This time, though, rather than just going to visit her, we decided to embark on a discovery journey and visit some places in Puglia we had been before.

These places had all one thing in common: despite being all small towns, they were as charming as big Italian cities.

When people go Italy, their normal itinerary features popular destinations such as Rome, Milan, Florence, etc. These are all beautiful cities for sure.

However, sometimes the most popular cities revealed to be not the right ones to visit if you really want to practise your Italian or if you really want to immerse yourself in the Italian culture. In fact, big Italian cities, especially during the holiday period, turn into huge, open air, “museums” that are just full of tourists -and no Italians!!

Little towns, instead, the ones that are often situated in the countryside or even by the coast, are the best places to discover the real “Italy”.

In small towns, you’ll find the real Italians. And people there just speak Italian. In these places, you have a real opportunity to practise this language as it’s fairly unlikely that someone will speak back to you in your native language.

If you want to have a real go at practising Italian, small Italian towns are the best.

And here are the small Italian towns I visited with my family – have a look at the photos I took and see if you like them!

Polignano a Mare

The historical centre of this town is inscribed in the Unesco’s world heritage list, and this tells already everything! Polignano a Mare is a little jewel situated on the Adriatic Coast  (the Eastern part of the Mediterranean sea!) with breathtaking views. Have a look at the photos I took!

I loved walking down the “lungomare” and around the sunny streets full of white buildings.

Because of it’s unique beauty, this city has been the set of many Italian films and TV series and it was also the birth palce of one of most internationally famous Italian singers, Domenico Modugno (below is photo of his statue in the city centre). If you’re not sure who I’m talking about, I bet you definitely know this song by him!

Galatina & Uggiano

If you’ve followed me for a while, you know that I love art. If you you do too, I bet you’d enjoy visiting the town of Galatina, which is the house of the Basilica di Santa Caterina d’Alessandria. This Basilica is absolutely amazing as its walls are all completely covered with frescos.  There isn’t an inch of this church that has not been painted.

Another thing you may know about me is that I love good food. After all I’m Italian! And after having visited Galatina I was so happy to know that we were heading to Uggiano to have our lunch in a farm restaurant situated in the middle of Puglia’s countryside. Here’s a photo of the place

There, we spent a few hours eating (yes, a few hours! 🙂 under the shades of the vines while enjoying the smell of the lemon plants. Needless to say, this was one my most favourite parts of the trip! 😛

Alberobello

This is a place I’ve visited at least 3 times and, despite this, I’m never tired of it. Alberobello is such a unique town with all its trulli. It has a magical atmosphere.

Unfortunately,  I don’t have any photo from Alberobello but believe me when I tell you that when you walk down its streets framed by those pointed white houses called trulli,  it seems you’re back to the Middle Age. But a more lively Middle Age ( far from being a  “Dark Age”!). This is a cute little town where everything is kinda uplifiting: the people, the nature, the shops, the buildings…

By the way, if you go there, make sure you try one of the traidtional liquori. The coffee on,. especilally. It’s my favourite! And this comes from someone who doesn’t drink coffee -despite being Italian!!

In small towns like these you can really feel the real Italy.

The one made of friendly, easy going and carefree people who live their life day by day.

If you’ve already been to any of this town, I’d love to hear your opinion about them (tell me in the comments below). If you’re planning to visit them, remember to brush off your Italian.

And remember that I’m here to help you with the Italian bit, if you need it!

I’m re- opening the application for Italian for Travellers at the end of the month. And this time you have also the online option!

What’s Italian for Travellers? It’s an Italian language course in mini groups of 6 people that aims to teach you the Italian you actually need to know to speak Italian with confidence on your next trip to Italy and enjoy the “dolce vita”.

This time, in addition to Italian for Travellers in Chester (UK), there will be also an online option, Italian for Travellers Online,  opened to learners who live outside the UK!

And here’s the best part: you can try the course for free!!

Here’s the link with the dates and times to book THE FREE ITALIAN CLASS   to experience Italian for Travellers!

Book now as there is a limited availability of places for this class!

Either way, I hope you’ll be able to join me, and if you can’t… I wish you to visit Italy soon, speak as much Italian as you can, and have the time of your life! Because this is what this is all about! 🙂

A presto,

Ermy***