Merry Christmas from Lecce, down in the "heel" of the Italian "boot"! We opted to travel here for a few days, rather than buy ourselves gifts for the holiday - choosing experiences over things. We are staying at the Grand Hotel di Lecce, which is just a couple of blocks from the train station, and from here it is about a five minute walk into the historic center of town. We arrived on Thursday via train - about a four-hour ride from Termoli station - and will head back to our comune on Monday.
So far the weather has been excellent, all things considered: temperatures are ranging from the high 50's to the low 60's Fahrenheit, and the skies vary between mostly sunny to partly cloudy. Very comfortable for exploring the city by foot.
After we arrived, we took a walk around to get our bearings and to find that night's dinner (the hotel clerk kindly arranged a reservation for us):
We had our dinner reservation for 8 PM (20:00) - which is normal (if not a little early) for this region; in Italy, the farther south you go, the later dinner tends to be served. In fact, when we first arrived at La Scarpetta Hostaria, we were the only ones there (fine by me; I'm still not entirely comfortable with indoor dining, so the fewer people, the better). The menu here was seafood-centric, which was fabulous because we haven't had a chance to eat much fresh seafood lately. I was very excited to see oysters on the menu. I was mildly disappointed to discover that they were poorly shucked, but I got over this quickly since they were so tasty:
Yesterday, Christmas Eve, we did some more exploring. We visited the Palazzo Vernazza, which is now a museum and archaeological site. One section showcases the Sanctuary of Isis and Purgatorium (a kind of immersion bath where worshippers would immerse themselves in waters brought from the Nile in Egypt). There is another area where you see some of the excavations relating to Messapian culture (they inhabited the area during pre-Roman times) and to later Roman-era structures. There is a room (lapidarium) where there are broken pieces of stones, columns, and the like; and another section where you can see the underground tanks in which lamp oil was once stored (lamp oil was a hot commodity during the 16th-19th centuries and greatly contributed to the wealth of the area). We had a guided tour given by a local student; there were also tablets which we used to scan QR codes for more information on the various exhibits. Towards the end of the tour, we were given AR glasses (more like goggles, really) that projected what the Sanctuary of Isis might have looked like back in the day. The virtual reality bit was interesting, but something of a struggle for me, because the headset didn't fit well over my normal, low-tech glasses, so I had to hold the thing out from my face with my hands. Paolo had an easier time using the device. I also found it difficult to take pictures of the exhibits while also juggling the tablet, but I did manage to snap a few:
We continued our walk-about, and headed for Piazza Sant'Oronzo (Saint Orontius is the city's patron saint). We saw the remains of the Roman amphitheater, as well the Column of Sant'Oronzo - though the statue of the saint is currently missing from atop the pillar; I have yet to find out what happened to it [edit: we discovered later that it had been removed for cleaning and repairs]. We also stopped at a nearby café for some lunch, caffè, and people-watching.
After an afternoon siesta, we headed back out for dinner at Pescheria con Cottura, located not far from the piazza where we had lunch. Instead of choosing your dishes from a printed menu, you chose your seafood (prior to being seated) from an open display case featuring a variety of fish, huge prawns, some kind of enormous crabs, octopus and squid, etc. There was also a rather long menu listed on a board on the wall. The restaurant motto is "In Fish We Trust." Why their motto is in English, I don't know.
I am writing this on Christmas Night; we just had a nice long chat with family via Facebook Messenger. It's about 20:25 (8:25 PM) and time to head back out to get a small bite and espresso to end the evening, so I'll make a separate Christmas Day post later...stay tuned.