Life stops in Apulia, at least for a couple of hours each day

There's more to Apulia than the trulli.

If you like hill towns and coastal villages, baroque architecture and meeting locals, you'll find much to like about this region. It's easier on the wallet than most parts of Italy, and it feels more relaxed.

The mid-day break, shortened to an hour or two in some parts of Italy, unofficially begins around 12:30 p.m., when the bars set out olives and crackers to go with red and gold pre-lunch aperitifs.

An hour later, life literally seems to stop. Stores close. Traffic disappears. Even the public fountains go off. Wander through any small town this time of day, and all you'll hear are the sounds of knives and forks clinking against plates.

When things start up again around 4:30 p.m., it's as if everyone has caught a second wind. There's a flurry of shopping until early evening, when the gelato shops do a brisk business, and the streets fill for the evening passegiatta.

Looking for a base from which to explore more of Apulia, we drove about 30 minutes from Alberobello to Conversano, a town about 5 miles from the Adriatic coast, just south of Bari. We settled in for the next three nights at Agriturismo Montepaolo (www.montepaolo.it)

Country inn fit for a count

More country estate than working farm, Montepaolo is a 16th-century stone farmhouse once used for hunting parties by its former owners, the Counts Acquaviva d'Aragona. Ninny Bassi's family bought it in the 1800s and used it as a summer home. Later, she set aside her career as an art teacher to convert it into an elegant, 10-room, villa-style inn for overnight guests.

Surrounded by olive groves and cherry orchards, Montepaolo is the kind of agriturismo that would command much more in Tuscany than the $122 a night we paid in May. We awoke to a breakfast of blood-orange juice, yogurt, homemade breads and homemade cactus jam. These were the quietest nights of our trip, spent in a large, airy room with marble floors, antique wardrobe and beds, and a modern bathroom. Floor-to-ceiling windows opened to a view of the pool.

At 20 euros extra each, about $25 (blame the falling value of the dollar against the euro), dinner was a splurge, but Ninny and her helpers put on a feast akin to a three-hour culinary walk through the Apulian countryside. We happily followed along for two of the three nights we were there.

The first night, a young Brazilian waitress named Leiliane practiced her English with us as she served pitchers of homemade wine along with plates of air-cured ham and homemade cheeses. These were followed by toasted squares of bread topped with tomatoes and basil and homemade olive oil, "to be eaten not with the fork; with the hands," Ninny instructed. Next came pasta tossed with smoked sausage, tomatoes and zucchini; veal; roasted fennel; and finally, tiny strawberries with cream in lemon and almond liquors.

Over the next couple of days, we followed Ninny's recommendations for visiting a few coastal towns not mentioned in any of the guidebooks. We also went back to explore more of Martina Franca near Alberobello, and, on the spur of the moment, pulled into a park-and-ride and took the bus into Bari.

Finding St. Nicolas

The chili-pepper-chocolate gelato in the seaside town of Polignano a Mare was the most unusual flavor we found in all of Italy. And I won't forget our leisurely lunch conversation with Theodoro Frattasio as we sat across from each under a shaded portico at Trattoria ai Portici in Martina Franca. Frattasio and his wife were in town from Taranto on the coast to do some antique shopping. He once lived in Cleveland, Ohio, and was eager to talk about politics and American views on terrorism.

But it was Bari that was the big surprise. Like Naples, it's a port city working to clean itself up and shake its reputation for crime. Palm trees and benches line the pedestrian shopping street Sparano da Bari, which sports Gucci, Nike and Benetton. There's a spiffed-up and well-lighted waterfront park and public beach, and the centro storico — old Bari — is a colorful residential neighborhood in the heart of a busy commercial city.

A piece of a Roman road, worn down by carts, sits in the middle of the Piazza Ferrarese near one of the old town gates. Kids ride bikes and kick soccer balls in the back alleys while their mothers hang out laundry and chat across the balconies.

We strolled through one morning and met Angela Abbesa, 62, sitting in her window, catching the sea breezes as she rolled out dough for the orecchiette — pasta so called because it's shaped like little ears — that she sells to neighbors and shops.

Around the corner, in the crypt of the Basilica di San Nicola, we watched as an Orthodox priest led a prayer service at the tomb of Saint Nicholas.

Bari's patron saint, Nicholas, was bishop of the Turkish city of Mrya in the fourth century. Italian sailors seized his remains 900 years ago after Islamic invaders captured the town. The relics of saints usually are scattered around churches in several countries, but most of Saint Nicholas' bones are preserved here.

A woman in a black dress and blue head scarf knelt at a gate in front of the tomb, which was lighted with red and yellow Turkish-style lamps. The priest placed a pile of letters next to the tomb — letters written by adults to Saint Nicholas the way children write to Santa Claus, the mythical figure he inspired. Then the priest put on a gold sash over his black cassock and began to chant, filling the room with a musical prayer.

Pilgrims like the woman in black come to Bari from all over Eastern Europe and Russia to worship at San Nicola, yet, like so much in southern Italy, it's off most tourists' radars. And here we were, once again, as we had been almost everywhere we went. No lines. No crowds. No charge to get in.