Southern Italy

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Volcanic, voluptuous and irrepressibly vivacious, southern Italy is a hypnotic collision of ancient cultures, exotic flavours and hedonistic urges. Welcome to where Europe ends and the rest of the world begins.

Few parts of Europe would dare compare their cultural riches to those of Italys Mezzogiorno (land of the midday sun). For millennia at the crossroads of civilisations, southern Italy is a World Heritage overachiever, bursting with superlative art and architecture. Let your imagination run wild among the prehistoric sassi (cave dwellings) of Matera, or the Disney-like trulli (conical dwellings) of the Valle dItria. Channel the past at the Greek temples of Segesta and Paestum, or on the haunted streets of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Compare the Byzantine glitter of Sicilys cathedrals to the darkness of Caravaggios Flagellazione in Naples. Then watch the region outdo itself with its idiosyncratic baroque. From Casertas gilded royal palace to the fantastical facades of Lecce and southeastern Sicily, the souths flood of frescoes, marble and curves will leave you begging for more.

The lust doesnt stop there. This is the countrys culinary soul, home to Italys best pizza, pasta, mozzarella, vegetables, citrus and seafood. Its like one never-ending feast: bubbling, wood-fired pizza and potent espresso in Naples; long, lazy lunches at vine-framed Pugliese farmhouses; just-caught sardines by lapping waves on a Tyrrhenian island; lavish, luscious pastries in chintzy Palermo pasticcerie (pastry shops). Should you go mushroom hunting in the wilds of Calabria? Taste-test your first red aubergine (eggplant) at an heirloom trattoria in Basilicata? Feast on fresh sea urchin on an Adriatic beach? Or just kick back with a glass of crisp local Falanghina as you debate who has the creamiest buffalo mozzarella Caserta, Paestum or Foggia? Whatever your choice, be certain that good food and wine will play starring roles in your southern sojourn.

Mother Nature went into overdrive in the south, creating a thrilling jumble of rugged mountains, fiery volcanoes and glittering coastal grottoes. Its like one giant playground begging to be tackled at a pace thats fast and furious, or romantic and relaxed. Crank up the heart rate white-water rafting down Calabrias river Lao; scaling Europes most active volcano, Stromboli; or diving into prehistoric sea caves on Puglias Promontorio del Gargano. If you need to bring it down a notch, the options are just as enticing, from slow pedalling across Puglias gentle countryside, or sailing along the Amalfi Coast, to simply stripping down and soaking in Vulcanos healing geothermal mud. The options may be many, but there is one constant a landscape that is beautiful, diverse and just a little magic.

Rugged mountains meet the jewel-like sea on the southern coast of Capri ()
DAVID TOMLINSON/LONELY PALNET IMAGES CREDIT

Nothing piques human curiosity quite like a mass catastrophe, and few have left a mark like Pompeii ( ), a once-thriving Roman town frozen in its death throes for all time. Wander Roman streets, the grassy, column-lined forum, the city brothel, the 5000-seat theatre and the frescoed Villa dei Misteri while you ponder Pliny the Youngers terrifying account of the tragedy: Darkness came on again, again ashes, thick and heavy. We got up repeatedly to shake these off; otherwise we would have been buried and crushed by the weight.

Pompeii street and Mt Vesuvius
JON DAVISON/LONELY PLANET IMAGES

Neapolitan Street Life

Theres nothing like waking up to the sound of a Neapolitan street market, whether its rough-and-ready Mercato di Porta Nolana ( ). A feast for the senses, these markets are as much akin to a North African bazaar as a European market: fruit vendors raucously hawking their wares in Neapolitan dialect, swordfish heads casting sidelong glances at you across heaps of silvery sardines on ice, the perfume of crunchy casareccio (homestyle) bread, and the cinnamon-laced aroma of sfogliatelle (sweetened ricotta pastries).

La Pignasecca
JEAN-BERNARD CARILLET/LONELY PLANET IMAGES

Temples in Agrigento

Few archaeological sites evoke the past like Agrigentos Valle dei Templi ( ). Located on a ridge looking out at the Mediterranean, its stoic, sunbaked temples belonged to Akragas, a once-great city settled by the Greeks. The scars of ancient battle endure in the 5th-century-BC Tempio di Hera, while the Tempio della Concordias remarkable state of preservation inspired Unescos own logo. To conjure the ghosts of the past, roam the ruins late in the afternoon, when the crowds have thinned and the wind whistles between the columns.

Tempio della Concordia
DIANA MAYFIELD/LONELY PLANET IMAGES

Capri

Even the summer hordes cant quite dilute the ethereal magic of Capri ( ). Described as one of the magnetic points of the earth by the writer and painter Alberto Savinio, Italys most fabled island has been seducing mere mortals for millennia. Emperor Tiberius reputedly threw his lovers off its dizzying cliffs, Grand Tourists waxed lyrical about its electric-blue grotto, and celebrities continue to moor their yachts in its turquoise waters. For a view you wont forget, head to the summit of Monte Solaro (think bath-time boats and sugar-cube houses).

View from Monte Solaro
CHRISTOPHER GROENHOUT/LONELY PLANET IMAGES

Alberobello

Your imagination will run riot in Alberobello ( ), famed for its kooky, one-of-a-kind architecture. Were talking trulli white-washed circular dwellings with cone-shaped roofs. Looking like theyre straight out of a Disney cartoon, these sunbaked dwellings tumble down the slopes like armies of hatted dwarves. You can dine in some of them, and sleep in others. Just dont be surprised if you need to pinch yourself Was that Snow White? Are you on Earth? Unesco seems to thinks so, bestowing World Heritage status on them in 1996.