Otranto

30/09/2008
We went to the tourist information first thing this morning. They were a surly bunch, not very helpful and we felt we were a nuisance interrupting their day. We got given a guide book and told if we wanted to know anything it was all in that.
We made our way to the cathedral where a magnificent 12th century mosaic covers the floor depicting the tree of life balanced on the back of 2 elephants. The young monk Pantaleone, who made it obviously had never seen an elephant and was very imaginative in depicting heaven and hell as well as including the classics, religion and superstition - Adam and Eve, Diana the huntress, Hercules, King Arthur, Alexander the Great and many sea monsters, monkey and snakes. It was a little disappointing as there were chairs set up over it but of course we were in time for a wedding.... There is a very goulish display in a chapel which houses the heads of the martyrs of Otranto who were beheaded by the Turks. We will return tomorrow and hopefully be able to view all the mosaic as it really would be worth seeing in its entirety.
This afternoon we drove the wild coastline to Santa Maria di Leuca the furtherest point on the stilleto and proclaimed to be where St Peter stepped ashore into Italy. There is a basilca there to commemorate the event. It is also the where the Adriatic and the Ionian seas meet.