Road trip around the Adriatic Sea, Part 3: A Greek island in Italy, the Promontorio del Gargano

July 24, 11:23 AMSF Motorcycle Travel ExaminerCarla King

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  The Promontorio del Gargano in Puglia, Italy on the Adriatic Sea

The Promontorio del Garganano doesn’t seem to belong to Italy at all. It is a geographic anomaly, a hunk of earth that lunges out into the sea. Millions and millions of years ago it started moving here from Dalmatia to settle uncomfortably, and now it seems to reach southeast toward Greece. Perhaps in another few million years it will have crossed the Adriatic and Ionian seas to reach its destination. Or maybe the fault will send it back home to Croatia.

It is a great road trip. Narrow country roads are badly banked and perched on crumbling white limestone cliffsides and there is close to zero traffic. For me, it is a perfect motorcycling destination, one of those places of extreme solitude and quiet. I stop often to turn the engine off and, from the shelter of the forest, look over the sparkling sea. The air is pine scented, heavy with salt, and occasionally layered with whiffs of rotting fish and burning brakes.

There’s not much here except nature and more nature, lots of campgrounds, and a couple of postcard-perfect villages, also with a Greek look to them. At the extreme eastern end of the island the town of Peschici glows opaquely on the side of a precarious cliff. Just past town is a hairpin turn so steep and badly cambered my left peg scrapes on an upturned swoop of the asphalt. Adrenaline gets me through it, and I only wonder how I managed it once it is behind me. But the cool mountain air calms my beating heart as I pass through acres of an ancient oak and beech forest, and a few rock-filled fields and into the farmland.

I stop to talk to a farmwife selling honey and olive oil, buy a small bottle and move on, then suddenly Vieste appears, another pretty village with white limestone cliffs and a charming old center. It, too, used to be a fishing village but now there is row after row campgrounds on the beach and behind them, hotels. There's a castle and a cathedral and pretty narrow street, but the main attraction is a huge network of grottos that can only be reached by sea. I imagine that the fishermen are making a better living toting tourists around in their boats than throwing their nets into the sea.

I want to stop but I just can't bear to. I'm in one of those extremely seductive motorcycle meditations and I don't want to be anywhere except riding, riding forever. The air is cool and the Moto Guzzi is in its element, the scenery is going by like a movie screen and people look up and wave as I go by. As the sun falls the road surface improves and I happily cruise along a cliff edge on a warm evening at sunset up and down and off and away not caring what is ahead or behind, just me with my shadow keeping a perfect pace.

Coming up in Part 4 - Brindisi and the ferry to Greece

Read Part 1 - Mandello del Lario and Lake Como
Read Part 2 - Venice to the Eastern Adriatic Coast