Bari is a working port city on the Adriatic, and a lot more rewarding than most riders expect. With nearly three hundred thousand people it is the capital of Puglia, with all the traffic that implies: loud, quick, a little chaotic, and entirely good-natured once you accept the rhythm. Use it as a place to start, to eat, to arrive. The ride proper begins when you leave town and the olive groves open up.
Bari Vecchia, the old town on its little peninsula, is the part to see. It is a maze of narrow lanes and whitewashed courtyards, where women still make orecchiette pasta by hand on tables outside their doors, and washing hangs overhead. The Basilica of San Nicola, begun in the late eleventh century, holds the relics of Saint Nicholas, brought from Myra in Turkey by Bari sailors in 1087, and it is a pilgrimage site for both Catholic and Orthodox Christians. The castle, the Norman-Swabian Castello Svevo, stands at the edge of the old town.
Riding in the city needs care. Streets are narrow, scooters weave everywhere, and cobbled lanes get slick in rain. Leave the bike in a secure car park outside the old quarter rather than inside it. Outside the centre, the coastal road north toward Trani and south toward Polignano a Mare is flat and fast, with sea views and the heat shimmering. The inland roads through the Murgia plateau are quiet, with dry-stone walls and stunning light in the late afternoon.
Fuel is plentiful, particularly along the ring road, and eating is the joy: focaccia barese with tomatoes and olives, raw seafood from the harbour, panzerotti fried to order, and a glass of Primitivo. In summer the heat is fierce in the early afternoon, so follow local habit and rest between one and four. Winter is mild but can be wet and windy. A morning on the coast and an afternoon among the olives is a very good day out.