| | Facilities within the Property |
 Inside the Masseria
"Serra dell'Isola" joins the tranquillity of a country mansion with the comfort of a modern city setting. You can have an internet ADSL point, even staying in the garden. But, if you prefer, you will discover the joy of being at leisure under the trees while reading a good book, when the mistral (north westerly wind) blows, the "wind of the Lords", as the farmers used to call it, because it is a gentle breeze that gets up late and brings up here the pleasant smell of the sea and the desire to relax having nothing to do.
You can walk or go out for a cycle ride, with bikes at your disposal at the masseria. If you like the sea, the beaches are just five minutes drive from the masseria. You can also hire a motor boat or sail boat and sail out Mola's picturesque harbour. You can use it for fishing, diving, or for exploring the coast south of Mola. The views of San Vito Abbey and Polignano, perched above its sea splashed caves, are unforgettable. |
 Cooking at Serra dell'Isola
Cooking at "Serra dell'Isola" varies with the seasons. There is a big variety of vegetables, legumes and fruits. Some recipes come, as those of the liqueurs, from my family's notebooks, where butter had little power, but extra-virgin olive oil of our secular olive trees was one of the main ingredients even in cakes. You will taste these ingredients in the rich healthy breakfasts that we serve or in the candlelight dinners.
The Rosolios of Rita
What's better than a wonderful ice-cream in a midsummer night? A home made almond or bitter orange ice-cream, with a cool rosolio.
I prepare special rosoli (home made liqueurs), realized on the basis of my great great grandmother's old recipes, Donna Ritella d' Erario Recchia. Such rosoli are obtained by the maceration of fruits and leaves left in pure alcohol, cool mixed with water and sugar. |
 Some of them have therapeutic properties, such as Nocino (Walnut), Laurel leaves, Basil, Eucalyptus and Cynara; others are excellent in exalting sweets and cakes, which they pleasantly accompany: for instance Cinnamon, Quince, Arbutus berries, Leaves of Sour Black Cherry, Red Mulberry, Canine Rose; some others may have other virtues that you will surely discover by yourselves, like Citronella, Corombonio, or the Rosolio of the Perfect Love. In a midsummer night. |
 Cooking Classes
Apulians were known as mangiafoglie e mangiamaccheroni (leaf and macaroni eaters) due the large use of vegetables, wild herbs, legumes and pasta, all cooked with pure olive oil. It's our typical cousine inherited from the time when the Bourbons reigned in Southern Italy, at the time known as the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. If you want, you can learn this kind of vegetarian cooking and you will discover that it's not so difficult to make pizza, pasta, focaccia and panzerotti. |
 Sculpture workshops
Fernando Nicotera, an Italian American sculptor originally from Mola offers sculpture workshops in Apulian limestone, throughout the year. You'll be chipping limestone in the shade of an olive tree and learn the basic substantive sculpting. Excursions to surrounding towns, focusing on the millenary use of limestone in Apulia in sculpture and architecture, complement the hands-on activity.
Discovering the manors of Apulia, the masserie: guided tour
Emotions still leave us astonished when walking through our manors, the masserie. Memories rapidly become inflamed like stubble fires: silence remains on the threshing-floors where resounded the songs of the "bracciali," the past Apulian agricultural workers. Solid giants of stone, the masserie have represented the most meaningful moment of the cultural, architectural and productive identity of the rural Apulia, from the 16th to the beginning of the 20th century. |
 Kingdom of the "gentlemen" and of the "peasants"- two classes that have developed and have handed down two philosophies of life that for centuries have followed one another in parallel, without ever meeting each other, if not for a few and illuminated afterthoughts - for both the masseria was the shell where to seek refuge, the arrival and departure point, all in one with the surrounding nature, poor and silent with the deeply loved nature. It was the bond with the earth intimately known. With patience, rocks were taken out of the ground and then used as dry wall fences, an soil worked slowly and deeply with the hoe, clean and dry when felt between the fingers. |
| Property Facilities Summary: |  ADSL Connection | Baby Sitting Service | | Bicycle Rentals | Candle Light Dinner | | Children's Playground | Computer | | Cooking Courses | Drawing Courses | | Excursions | Guided Tours | | Home Produce | Internet Connection | | Internet Wireless | Ironing Equipment | | Italian Language Lessons | Olive Oil Tasting | | Outlet Tours | Power Boat Hire | | Private Boat Tours | Private Parking | | Shuttle To / From Airport | Shuttle To / From Rail Station | | Trekking | Wi-Fi | | Wine Tasting | Wine Tours | | |
Between sea and land
Stop and catch, in the underground oil-mills and in the rocky constructed churches disseminated along our country, the expression of a spontaneous architecture made of stone by the "ants people", as the Apulian writer Tommaso Fiore used to call the master stone-cutters and the same past inhabitants of Apulia. Do not forget to visit the Abbey of St. Vito in Polignano, illustrated by the Desprez in the Voyage Pittoresque Description ou Royaumes de Naples et de Sicile; this book alone constitute an alternative guide of the neighborhoods; in the same book Polignano has been described with its sea caves, breathtaking when seen from the terraces above the sea or, even better, from the sea itself. In Conversano, in the narrow streets of its historical center, legends come back to the mind, legends tied up with the "Guercio of Puglia," the terrible Earl Acquaviva. Rutigliano has a magnificent ancient village, in the heart of which there are shops ceramic displaying works by masters.The terracotta whistle fair that take place in January in occasion of the feast of Sant'Antonio Abate reflects the skill of the local craftsmen. With regard to ceramics, you can't leave Apulia without visiting Grottaglie, whose ancient and charming ceramics quarter is full of shops were ceramic masters craft the most famous pottery of our country, known worldwide.In the pottery quarter there is also a museum devoted to this old traditional art.
Little known Museums
The Jatta Museum of Ruvo di Puglia is a museum within the museum, because remarkable archaeological findings are collected and exposed in the same order that his collector had collected them between the '700 and the '800. The museum of Villa Meo Evoli in Monopoli is settled in the same way. Very attractive are the Art Galleries of Bari, where you can find works of the greatest painters of Puglia, the Painting Collection of Michele De Napoli in Terlizzi and the Painting Collection of Giuseppe De Nittis in Barletta.
- The National Archeological Museum of Taranto
Taranto (Taras in Greek) was founded by Spartans in 706 BC. It was, and still remain, a city of wealth and learning. It was one of the major centre for the teaching of Pythagorean philosophy, and Plato indicated Taras as one of the hubs for learning of Magna Grecia. Famous for its wool and its wine, the city also produced a much-admired purple dye from the murex shellfish in its harbour. The National Archeological Museum of Taranto present a vast selection of objects of art production in which the Tarantines excelled: gold jewellery and terracotta figurines and vases, whose painted garments suggest the splendor of Taranto's famous dyed woollen cloth.
Who is curious to see a small shipyard where wooden boats are built using skills and works made by hand, as it was done one hundred years ago, I suggest to visit the shipyards of Gaudiuso and Cinquepalmi in Mola, real craftsmen of gone times. |
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