Puglia

It is the easternmost region of Italy, and you can touch the fact: from Punta Palascìa, near Otranto, Albania is seventy-two kilometres away and the Greek island of Fanò eighty. There are 257 comuni in six provinces, with eight hundred kilometres of coast facing two seas, the Adriatic and the Ionian, and centuries-old olive trees as far as the eye can see: almost half of Italy's olive oil is produced here. The capital is Bari, but the region has no single centre: Taranto, Foggia, Andria, Barletta and Lecce all pass eighty thousand inhabitants.

Two UNESCO sites, recognised in the same year, 1996, could not be less alike: the trulli of Alberobello, with their dry-stone conical roofs, and Castel del Monte, the octagon Frederick II had built and whose purpose is still argued over. Around them, the Valle d'Itria white with lime, the exuberant baroque of Lecce, the sea stacks of the Gargano and the beaches of Salento, which in summer become Italy's holiday capital. At table simplicity rules: orecchiette, burrata, frisa and oil.