Tuesday, March 3, 2015

The Summer city in Winter time

Yes, I was so craving for sun and Summer-like warmth, that I wanted to go to Vieste, which is, definitely, a great place to go to in the Summer!

Well, it was February with February-like weather. And Winter is still Winter even we are in the south of Italy.

Most probably because of this, most part of the Vieste was closed down and the remaining part mostly empty. Some exceptions were the sidewalks in front of a cafe where a number of men would be standing and talking like they had nothing else on their minds (probably they didn't!). It is worth to highlight that we could only see men around, there were almost no women on sight. This seems to be the reality of a city and population that lives for the Summer. In the colder months they just hang around or stay at home as most gelaterias/cafes/restaurants/souvenir shops are closed. The old part of Vieste, despite beautiful, looked like a ghost town with no one on the streets and the buildings showing the sign of their age.

But, as with mist things, there were great upsides to this trip as well, it wasn't all cold and darkness! Really cool ones actually. After getting a deal on a room just two steps from the seaside (see photos of the view from our window) on a hotel where we were the only guests we decide asking for a good restaurant (one that would be open).

The view at sunset. The photo is terrible 'cause I was still asleep :P
This was also taken from our room but in a different angle. It was a great view! :)
The guy from reception gave us three options. Our first pick (a place by the sea) was, of course, closed!
The second restaurant though, despite our fears, was open! A huge restaurant with only a couple of tables taken. A guy that looked like the owner was waiting the tables and was, literally, dragging his feet from one place to the other. I was chivering at this time. Outside was cold and humid and inside it was not warm enough to provide instant comfort. So the feet-dragging owner, without asking anything, brought us an ashes bowl just next to our table! SO GOOD! I haven't seen one of those in many many years and had already forgotten how warm and confy it could be! That gesture together with the food that was, as usual in this trip, great put this place in our hearts for a long time!

We could stretch our arms/legs and our hands/feet with be on top of it! So warm!!

There is not much of a great nightlife in a ghost town so we went straight into the hotel. In the morning after, the Sun decided to redeem itself for some hours and showed us how beautiful this city can be! The dramatic cliffs, the color of the sea! It made us wish to come back in a bit more sunnier, warmer and busier time! :)

It was quite beautiful :)

City's bay

If you turned to one side you saw this...

...turned to the other side and saw this!
Me
And Andre :)
Umbria forest is just nearby and it was absolutely eerie in a great way

Sunday, March 1, 2015

We went to the "movie"

Back to when I was still looking for interesting places and different things to do, Matera came out as one of the "must go" places for the city and the Sassi (see Matera Rocks!! post), but also for something else! Apparently its streets and surrounding scenary are great to shoot movies set in the ancient times; the most famous is Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ.  So two weeks after that Internet search, there we were, in the streets that had seen many different filming crews!

When we first arrived we went directly to the booked Bed and Breakfast and met Sophie, the sister of our host. They are both French and really nice! Sophie, with whom we talked the most, was happy to answer our many questions and gave us a news that we were not expecting: "You know, they are shooting another film now! It's the new movie of Ben-Hur! If you go out you might see them!" Of course, that sounded amazing to us! As movie enthusiasts, this sounded like a one of a kind opportunity!

So we went out! The night was already falling but our hopes were up! In the first viewpoint, where we wered amazed by the old city itself, we also spotted a specific area that was highly illuminated. That had to be it! Even in the distance we understood that we were looking to the place where the "action" was happening! So we decided to try and reach that area. I confess that with that distance and with no clue of where they were in a map, I was not too hopeful! A few ups and downs, following some signs (there were actually signs pointing somewhere saying "Location", I still have no idea what location they meant!) and we were at a point where we couldn't even locate ourselves in the map (again, see Matera Rocks!! post for the whole story). So we decided to just enjoy the city for the city itself.

Next morning we decided to head to the most "rocky" place of the old town. When we go around a rock/church, we see these big spotlights being put into place all pointing to somewhere below. In that place below is a set of a ancient Rome-like square and, out there in the distance, a bunch of Roman guards. This was it! This was where they would be filming that morning!

Spotlights over a rock/church
Ancient Rome-like square
Bunch of Romans in the distance
They were actually two sets, just nearby. One of a kind of a market and the other of the Roman square. We just stood by looking into the first one as we chose not to disturb whatever they were doing, and eventually, we started moving again. But to get out of that area we went right through the set of the second set! We even walked pass a couple of Romans carrying another bloodied-face, dead Roman!



Seconds later, and just like Lazarus, he rose! Miracle!! Yeah, it's the miracle of the movies :P. They were not even filming, just rehearsing their scene! As we continued walking into the square, the production team was putting together all the gear. We decided to go behind their "base camp" and watch for a while. People were setting the rails for the cameras, dusting the Roman guards' capes a bit more, rehearsing one time and again with empty glasses and food that was still not there. It was pretty cool!! :)
There are not many photos of it as I didn't want to be kicked out because of that. But here are a few!


1st Set: The market (?)
Andre in set 1

Prepping the 2nd set
Last indications
"Yeah, it still needs more dust"
Before leaving I wanted a proof that I was there :p
From here the two sets were visible. The first is the smoky part, the other is the "busy" area. An impressive view to which the Ben-Hur shooting is only the cherry on top of everything!




Matera rocks!!

When we first started to look for places to go to in this trip Matera was almost never mentioned, mainly because it is not part of the Puglia region. But here and there I saw mentions of this place and there was one blog post that was so enthusiastic about it that I got curious. Apparently the city was home for the first settlers in Italy than inhabited the Sassis. Houses on the rocks, either natural or, later on, man-made! For what we've heard, even the houses that exist today were excavated on the rock, and the stones removed from the ground were used in the construction of that same house! Isn't all this worthwhile?!

After Bari, and with a rented car, we drove to Matera, the city of the Sassi (or rocks, in English)! The weather was not great and it was cold! When we were entering the city in direction to the bread&breakfast we had booked the previous night, we did not get very excited! It looked like any other city, with only a few rocks near the entrance! The landscape before it was of an amazing green but we couldn't even see it from the city!

When we finally got installed and were ready to head out the night was already falling over the city! For a small moment, with the little enthusiasm I felt, with the rain and cold and the few light remaining, I felt like staying inside! But when we got to the first view point, I understood the reason for all the fuss. The old part of the city is beautiful and with some houses emerging from the rocks, quite unique as well.

Our first view over the old town and the Sassi

Matera, emerging from the rocks
Once again the streets were narrow and maze-like. And once again we just walked around not caring much about where we were going. A lot of ups and downs later we got to the top of one of the hills where we could see all the houses on the opposite slope. It was amazing, and I could not resist to take a few additional photos:



That was it! I haven't even seen it in the day light and I already loved that place!!
After walking around a bit more we got out of the old city but we were not sure exactly where we were. The map did not help much as there were dozens of narrow streets to look at. A man passed by and we asked him where we were on the map! But this was not simple at all. Our Italian is not the greatest of all ("yo no capisco"- was used numerous times during the trip) and the man's English was even worse (but apparently his daughter can speak English quite well, too bad she wasn't there! :p). With this, asking a simple "Where are we?" pointing to a map proved to be quite challenging. On top of that, when we were finally able to communicate, he took a while to locate us on our map! But he was so nice that he did not quit and only when we were able to understand, approximately, our location, he stopped looking at the map with a big smile on his face! "Grazie mile" was our response (another expression used quite often on these days!

We stopped to eat something in another great, delicious and cheap cafeteria and headed back home going through the most touristic part of the city. Full of shops and restaurants that got our stomachs' attention.

The next day, under a cloudy sky, the Sassi of the old town remained as impressive as the previous night. And the views over the canyon were kind of spectacular.
Matera!!
On top of that, Matera had another surprise waiting for us. But that is material for another post. Now, I'll just leave with some other photos of this "oh so worth it" place!


:)
Up and down, down and up!
A house or a rock?


Can you see the building with the red strip on top! That's where we stayed that nigh!
Andre could not resist! :)

The next post explains what all those trucks are about! :)
As beautiful by day as it was on we saw it for the first time at night - part 1 
As beautiful by day as it was on we saw it for the first time at night - part 2 
The headless statue!

Can you find the skulls! That's plural!
We were there! (Andre)
We were there! (me)