Salentine Peninsula

diverting Roman remains and a wealth of fine architecture scattered about an appealing old town area. It's also a good starting point for excursions further into the Salentine peninsula, which begins south of the city. In keeping with the city's long association with traders and settlers, the landscape here begins to take on a distinctive Greek flavour, a mildly undulating region planted with carob, prickly pear and tobacco. The Adriatic coast is pitted with cliffs, topped with ruined watchtowers, with rugged coves and caves right the way down to the southern cape. The hinterland, by comparison, is more barren, although there's again a Greek element to it, with its tiny, sun-blasted villages growing out of the dry, stony, red earth and the flat-roofed houses painted in bright pastel colours.