Matera, Italy
What an incredible place. The drive here was amazing. I had just come from sleeping in my car in this very strange little town and I was more than happy to get out of there! I took my time driving to Matera, I took every single backroad possible. Even with that, it only took me a couple of hours to get there.
The landscape was beautiful and dry. I passed field after field. Seeing the scattered farms nestled in the hills, traveling behind tractors and the random 80 year old man on a Vespa.
I arrived in Matera at the heat of the day. This summer has been extremely hot in Italy. I was staying with another Couchsurfing host in this town and he wasn’t available until the evening so I had the day to pass. The heat made it almost unbearable to walk within all of the old stone walls. I made my way through what I could and then found myself in the grass at the base of the castle perched up on the hill. There, I enjoyed my picnic of fresh mozzarella and tomatoes and soon after took a nap.
Once the day cooled slightly, I ventured back into the old town. Matera is such an amazing city built within the rocks, i sassi. The town has a lot of history, dating way back to 7000 BC. It is known predominantly for all of the cave dwellings, said to be among one of the first human dwellings. People dug and built their homes within the rocks, their homes on top of other homes, on top of other homes. It’s a complete system of stacked homes inside the mountains. It’s pretty amazing.
In the 1950’s the government started to push people out of the cave dwellings to the modern city. This was enforced because of the unhealthy living conditions. Matera has faced extreme poverty throughout it’s existence. It’s not recently (relatively speaking) that the tourism industry has started to grow, and there have been big pushes for the regeneration of the Sassi.
My Couchsurfing host lived right in the heart of the city. The view was amazing from his place. We spent the first night taking his dog out for a walk. There, I got to meet all of his friends and we ended up ordering pizza and visiting in the park. While there, I experienced some of the most torrential downpours and thunderstorms. It was amazing to hear the cracking sounds and to feel the thunder vibrating throughout the old town. Streets flooded and water gushing down the mountainside.
