Alex Polizzi's Secret Italy | Puglia, Lecce & Matera | Full Episode | S1EP04

my italian pilgrimage concludes in the far south an area of some of the most untouched regions and for me unfamiliar territory that's ripe for exploration i'll be discovering the region of puglia before spending time within italy's largest national park and i'll be taking in the sights of the magical city of matera when you travel this far south there is no shortage of iconic beauty spots in fact here you'll discover some of the cleanest sapphire scenes and sandy beaches in the country [Music] but i think the whole character of italy begins to change and the region of puglia found at the heel of the country's boot has its own very distinctive identity with its lush farmland magical truly sparkling whitewashed towns and searing climate julia somehow feels nearer to the wilds of nearby greece than the nobility of distant rome this region's mile upon mile of arid farmland reflects its humble agricultural past and today it's famous for its produce which includes exceptionally good wine but deep in the heart of rural puglia you'll find a vineyard with a difference where the wine is a reminder of the south's most sinister side [Music] it's no secret that italy has a serious problem with the mafia and this corner of the country has felt the force of it more than most here there is a constant invisible threat of organized crime but there are grassroots organizations now fighting it [Music] well [Music] both inspiring and courageous [Music] the cooperative organically farms the land here and they've built up a reputation for award-winning wines even though there is a terrifying tension over what the mafia might do next the biggest problem when they started was that no one it's a pretty frightening reality to live with but in the show of support for the anti-mafia movement people now queue up to work here among the vineyards like head agronomist fabio does [Music] congress [Music] nevertheless standing here at the entrance to the chapel where reputedly the mafia used to initiate new members it's difficult not to be cowed by the sobering history behind these wines [Music] de the names they call these wines honor the memories of victims of the mafia but they do not bang on about it of course they think it's important to present a fund against mafia but first of all they want people to buy their products because they're stupendous while the war against the ever-present mafia is still being fought i think this is a beautiful way to pay tribute to its victims and a hint that there's much more than meets the eye to the surprising south there are parts of the region of puglia that have a distinctly foreign feel and to understand why you need to look to its past the geography of the region made it right for invasion and for centuries every major power of the period colonized puglia each country left a lasting legacy on the landscape from the turkish to the greek but it's the baroque beauty of the city of lecture that makes it one of the most celebrated sights of the south [Music] for me lecher is the jewel in puglia's crown this is called the florence of the south every single building in the historic center is made out of the same local stone [Music] you know the architecture changes so dramatically between the north and the south [Music] the cities are more decaying and there's a greater attrition of time in a way but they are romantic with the capital r these wonderful baroque facades that you won't find anywhere else in the world a city of golden honey hues lecher is becoming an increasingly popular part of italy's tourist trail as visitors experience its relaxed rhythm and laid-back cafe culture but for all its grandeur it's not the only example of pure architectural beauty that can be found in this region [Music] even the smallest towns can be visually striking my favorite being the little known hillside town of lokorotongo [Music] its labyrinth of lanes have afforded it listed status as one of the most beautiful villages in italy and deservedly so it is perfect it's like this little jewel the impression is a very clean beauty it's the kind of place you dream of living [Music] to come across an unexpected gem like this which feels more connected to its southern mediterranean neighbors than to italy is all part of the appeal of puglia it's like a lot of little towns in greece whitewashed to keep reflect the sun to keep the heat away white was also historically used to repel the plague don't know how effective it was but it's certainly pretty perched 400 meters up the stunning vista out across the arid landscape is a reminder of how precious water is here and a reason for the distinctive pitch roofs of the town these roofs are called comed and they're very particular to this part of the world there's very little rain here and so every single bit of rainwater has to be harvested so that it can be reused and this design makes sure that it is an hour or two wandering these peaceful streets allows you to immerse yourself in its culture one that even now nods to its peasant past here the butcher has always been at the heart of village life and it's no different today inside you can indulge in the tradition of a concept that was born out of peasant life i love god my belly my full fat belly for the butcher there was money to be made from their otherwise less appealing leftovers each day [Music] okay so it's a bit of the neck that has had the bone taken out of it that is rolled with cheese in the middle they would grill the meat for the locals in a wood-fired oven and serve it to them straight away in the shop the village folk would save on charcoal and wood with the added bonus of enjoying an evening out with the neighbors looking good i mean i can't say i believe it's very dietetic but my goodness is good age-old traditions like these were what brought people together in puglia's towns and villages but some are more curious than others [Music] spending time in puglia you may discover the region has its own unique soundtrack it's not unusual to happen upon a crowd of people dancing the nightly to the frenzied rhythm of tambourines and violins this is a folk dance known as a pizzican [Music] [Applause] fast frenetic and hypnotic the pikachu derives from the centuries-old concoction of faith in peasant culture [Applause] [Music] this devilish dance was thought to have been the only way to banish the poison of a tarantula bite it's almost like an exorcism a musical catharsis it can go on for hours the pizzica music is merely a hint of the rich history and folklore of the [Music] region and it's likely you'll be met by the atmospheric sights and sounds of its people [Music] yes a curious beehive shaped house that you only find here these fairy tale looking structures have peppered this landscape for the last 5 000 years [Music] today most have been converted into shishi bmbs and holiday homes but graziella has lived in her true love for most of her life in a land where cuisine is king julia's peasant cooking is legendary fava beans have fed the poor here for hundreds of years 500 kilos of these her and her husband and she's 80 by the way it took a week to harvest so as evening entertainment when it's raining or when they're sitting by the fire they sit there and they take off the hard skin is these have got to be placed into boiling water for five minutes the time to say a catholic credo and then they are spread out in the sun on the fields to become completely dry to then have this work done to them at which point they will be ready to be cooked so next time you have a bean salad think of that last [Music] a staple dish here is the classic fava bean puree she is mashing up the fava beans with a bit of potato boiled potato as well and some olive oil and that is it [Music] she's just got the technique look at that the more you beat them the smoother and the whiter the pace becomes in the old days she used to make this every single day so she must have done thousand it in our lives she's getting tired she says it's not like it used to be a question yesterday this is a poor people's dish she says uh this is a dish that you can always eat [Music] this part of my adventure has been unexpected but the further i head into this remote part of italy the more rugged rustic and surreal it becomes [Music] a world away from the sun bleached tale landscape of puglia the heart of southern italy is eaten up by the majestic expanse of the country's largest national park montepolino here the sublime scenery is a complete surprise to me the vast landscape stretches across the regions of calabria and basilicata its imposing peaks wooded glens and rushing streams retain an ancient rugged charm still yet to be tainted by mass tourism it is an undiscovered treasure for many italians too the park is peppered with several sleepy villages and small towns many of them with an intriguing history this one the peaceful town of chivita hints at why this part of the country has a distinctly foreign feel pepe is a guide to the local area good morning good morning how are you the albanians crossed the adriatic sea 500 years ago fleeing the ottoman empire they settled [Music] makes for a great start to the day but its positioning within the park also makes it a gateway to the wilderness beyond [Music] [Applause] [Music] uh [Applause] the epic vistas of montepolino are an adventurous playground apparently there's extreme mountain biking here there's canyoning there's rafting and there's free climbing or for the more sedentary amongst us there is merely marveling at the view but if that wasn't appealing enough you can also discover an abundance of wildlife here from golden eagles to a few shy wolves and a band of feral mountain goats [Music] um [Music] i've got no idea how they get up there or more importantly how you'd get down pretty inhospitable place to live [Music] [Applause] but for some the remoteness of the park make it an idyllic place to call home [Music] and for carpenter quirino the abundance of wood all around offers a perfect and unexpected [Music] [Music] from the piece of his workshop in the wilderness using locally sourced wood quirino a musician himself hand crafts what looks like a complicated cousin of the scottish bagpipes [Music] [Music] hey [Music] i really wasn't expecting to find this here and such an intaunting sound [Music] [Applause] yes it's party music you can tell from the kind of beat that it's music people to dance to particularly couples and i must say i was tapping away with my foot to me italy is like a rich tapestry each region another colorful patch on the quilt is no exception it's one of the least populated least visited and least understood regions in the country one of the smallest too [Music] but hidden in this remote arid landscape is one of the most intriguing places i've ever been to the ancient city of matera is both haunting and beautiful [Music] i came here on my honeymoon and i've longed to uncover more of its enchanting secrets ever since i love matera [Music] it's one of the first continuously inhabited sites in europe and so it's got this immense resonance and history which i find most appealing it's a very timeless landscape and it's unusual that you have so little modern that intrudes into your consciousness [Music] i mean this is one of the glories of italy and if you haven't seen it you really should come walking through its atmospheric streets it's easy to feel like you've stepped back in time it's almost biblical today it's hard to imagine that not so long ago matera was known as the shame of italy in the 1950s families were crammed into its cave houses living along livestock with no running water or sanitation in abject poverty the swallow and malaria-ridden conditions became a national scandal the entire population of 20 000 people were forcefully relocated to new housing projects leaving it an empty shell a ghost town [Music] francesco has some astonishing memories of matera francisco what's your connection to this place it's a very strong connection all my family was born here i was born here as well and ancestors going back to time century the century or my family was from here and so i have a very strong relation to matera this area was completely abandoned where i was born after when i was 20 years old and so i used to come here because it was everything was deserted was a big ghost town and for a kid for a teenager it was like a big playground so i was feeling like a little indiana jones with all friends of mine as everything was for us to know and to explore and to discover there was nobody around just us this is the part of the historic city this is the newer bit though isn't it this is the newer the newest part of the old town yes so resale when was when does it i mean when was it you get back to the 1400 1400 so 600 years ago roughly of course and that so that's the new bit and the old bird they are the caves and they are thousands of years old and all the caves that are hidden beyond the buildings they dead back ten thousand years ago six thousand years ago so in every house people sleep in the same place of their ancestor of 10 000 years ago which is quite amazing until recently the caves remain damp derelict and abandoned but now matera has emerged from the dark shadows of its recent past in the 90s unesco declared it a world heritage site and since then there has been a complete renaissance in the fortunes of this national treasure this was my grandparents home where my mother was born as well now is a hotel room gosh would this have been for one family yes that's correct then there were just three people my pa my grandparents and my mother was it in a terrible state when you got your hands on it again yes it was in very stable set i still have the pictures everything was black on the on the ceiling it was rubbish around the place it's like you felt like you are in pompeii that's that alcove yes and this this is the ceiling is the ceiling with now it's painted there was a big fire here that's why everything is black in the picture there was a big fire during the abandoned time this was taken in 1952 and you can see all the clothes hanging people and old women chatting the little car the wheelbarrows yes and this is just 20 years later everything is abandoned unbelievable yes it was like this till the 90s it's astonishing it's a wonderful comparison now one of these lady was my grandmother and they had to leave [Music] how did your grandparents feel when they had to move out were most people of their generation they were quite quite happy to move because we were the shame of italy the disgrace of italy so they were happy to move to new hiberus they were modern and so they just abandoned them it was my generation to understand the value that we were losing as this was not just the disgrace of italy it was an incredible heritage that we were losing and it's not a coincidence that in their generation matera was the shame and the disgrace of italy in my generation is a world heritage and everything has changed and now we do understand that what the italy thought it was a shame was just a picture of a very long film yes that which is going on it has been going on for 10 000 years and will last for 10 000 years more [Music] matera may be europe's most dramatic story of rebirth tourists are now flooding back to the city but this is not a landscape that's been blemished by modern life luxury hotels are concealed within its honeycomb of caves [Music] i'm told that nothing can quite prepare you for a visit to legrotto de la chivita a luxury hotel with a difference so tell me a bit how long this hotel has been here and the idea behind it the idea is to preserve the history the cultural uh tradition of the places and the people from this place this case were abandoned in the 50s and now it's possible to come back and leave this atmosphere this ancient feeling of the past it took 10 years to restore these ancient caves into 18 boutique bedrooms wow this is lovely very beautiful [Music] look at that view as well it's amazing i mean it's very rarely that i'm blown away by somewhere but this is completely blown me away it's romantic and it's done with just such immaculate immaculate taste the lighting the furniture the linen and the candles everywhere and and and and it's just really very nice so let's should we in this case we're just houses houses for peasants and for poor people they used to live with animals with donkeys and now it's completely different of course we try to restore this case in the most authentic way possible it's lovely to see something that has been restored so lovingly and so carefully and that is kind of quite true still to certain elements of how things used to [Music] be gus i've always felt that you should be able to wake up in a hotel and know exactly where you are in the world but this is something else makes me very dissatisfied with my current living arrangements [Music] it really is amazing i can't think of a hotel that's captured my imagination more actually but matera is a city of two extremes as i'm about to discover until 25 years ago the southern italian city of matera was the desolate deserted and dirty secret of italy it was called italy shane matera and it's lovely to see it blossom into a pride officially today its subterranean slums have become a luxury destination unlike any other in the country and matera is now fated around the world but what's less celebrated outside of the city is the annual festival the centuries-old feast of the madonna de la bruna [Music] in a workshop in the heart of the city the finishing touches are being applied to a lovingly handmade float it forms the centerpiece of the festa the float is a real work of art built out of papier-mache and decorated with ornaments and statues of saints it takes four months to design build and decorate at a cost of about 25 000 euros but for all its glory this masterpiece always meets an ugly end in the days leading up to the festa no one in the city sleeps italians love a festa and this is one of the more impressive ones that i've ever heard about i've never seen it before it's all tied up with a historic religious significance but it's become more than that it's become a sign of pride not just in your region but in your specific town or city i believe they're going to be 60 000 people here tonight i ask specifically to be removed from the crowd because quite honestly i've never seen more armed police than a rather violent football match i mean they're they're three deep the police down there i don't know what they think is going to happen but they're obviously prepared for the worst it may be little known outside of me but this festa is a very big deal to the people here do you think it would be wrong to do a selfie [Music] look now quite a lick is coming it all looks terribly unsafe the float makes a ritual journey through central material teasing and dividing the crowds as it passes the twinkling decorations before returning to the square to meet its ultimate fate the tension is definitely building what can i say they are putting their helmets on i think that is the sign that they expect something to happen quite soon oh my god all the guys are trying to get already preparing to get over the [Music] barricade oh my god it's so exciting and they come [Music] [Applause] oh [Applause] like wild animals it's a rite of destruction a frenzy of religious devotion look they're gathering trophies they're gathering trophies [Applause] taking home any piece of the float is thought to bring good luck and the competition is ferocious [Applause] [Music] [Applause] oh my god oh my god [Applause] look at him with jesus less than 70 seconds the wreckage is complete [Applause] the float is nothing more than a carcass a skeleton of its former self four months of this artist's work of creating this float god in seconds this festival is a fitting finale to my italian travels [Music] i consider myself incredibly fortunate to have had the opportunity to step outside of my everyday life and experience the length and breadth of a country that means so much to me i burrowed into its great cities immersed myself in its rich culture [Music] and revisited the people and places that are so dear to me alex hi darling and what's become more and more apparent to me is there's something wonderful something unusual something unexpected around every corner there's so much to italy there's this huge interior that very few tourists relatively speaking still discover which is a shame because there's so many jewels here culinary architectural historical you could keep coming back here for 20 years and always find something new [Music] but more than anything this trip has allowed me to learn about myself when i was younger i always used to think that as an italian i felt rather too loud and too emotional for england when i came to italy i was considered very british now i feel as if i've got the best of both worlds how lucky i am to have such a rich dual heritage [Music] it's kind of strengthened my ties to italy again it's reminded me of why i feel italian and what i love about it so much here it's very hard not to love italy i always have but it's nice to be reminded of why [Music] you

Channel: The Hotel Inspector

Views: 173,366

Rating: 4.9164119 out of 5

Keywords: The Hotel Inspector, Alex Polizzi, hotelier Alex, Alex Polizzi the hotel inspector, Budget hotel, worst rated, worst rated hotel, worst rated hotel room, worst hotel review, hotel reviews, hotel restoration, restore, professional restoration, hotel impossible, worst restaurant reviews, rated restaurants, Confronts owner, confronting owners, confrontation, travel, italy, spain, spectacular spain, secret italy

Id: z00Ct2KE5jg

Length: 41min 47sec (2507 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 15 2021