Basilicata & Calabria - Italy’s undiscovered south

Fly at c. 8.00am from London Gatwick direct to Bari (British Airways). Drive into Basilicata. First of four nights in Matera – our hotel is in the re-developed Sassi.

Morning walk through the improbably picturesque streets, whose ancient dwellings are crammed into a ravine. Set-pieces include the quirky late Romanesque church of San Giovanni Battista, the Baroque church of San Francesco, Palazzo Lanfranchi and the recently restored cathedral, a fine example of southern Italian Romanesque. In the afternoon, walk through the Sasso Caveoso to see a handful of cave churches, most them frescoed, finishing at the delightful San Pietro Caveoso.

Drive along the valley of the Bradano to the monastery of La Santissima Trinità at Venosa, impressive but unfinished, built alongside a surviving early Christian church. Walk through the charming town centre and to the archaeological collections in the 15th-century castle. Continue to Melfi, the centre of Norman power in the early phases of their immigration and conquest of southern Italy. The impressive Norman castle hosts a good archaeological museum, and the cathedral remains substantially Romanesque.

The fortuitous discovery of the Crypt of the Original Sin a few miles south of Matera in 1963 was a significant artistic event, bringing to light one of the most accomplished cycles of Carolingian painting known in Europe; it is not only an outstanding discovery for the history of early medieval art but is also an example of the most advanced conservation techniques. Return to Matera to visit the archaeological museum. The afternoon is free.

Metaponto was one of the most important Greek settlements on the shores of the Ionian sea – though its site is ruinous, the exemplary museum charts much of its history. Isolated and offering breath-taking views across the valley of the river Agri, Santa Maria d’Anglona is one of the loveliest churches in southern Italy, rich in 12th-century frescoes. Picnic lunch here. Drive south-east along the coast to the ruins of the Achaean city of Sybaris. Overnight near Rossano.

Start with the beautifully sited Abbazia del Patire, an 11th-century monastery founded under early Norman patronage just outside Rossano. Thence to the city itself to see tiny medieval San Marco and, in the Museo Diocesano, the celebrated codex rossanensis, a superb sixth-century manuscript made in Constantinople. Drive across the Calabrian peninsula to Cosenza – visit the cathedral – and continue to Calabria’s western seaboard near Lamezia. First of three nights near Lamezia.

In Vibo Valentia, an ancient Greek city historically famed as a tuna fishery, visit the Baroque cathedral, serene 16th-century church of San Michele and the part-Norman part-Hohenstaufen castle, looming over the town on the site of the former acropolis. Then drive to Reggio to see the Riace Bronzes, over-life-size male nudes associated with Phidias and Polyclitus. Discovered off the Calabrian coast near Locri, they are among the finest Greek sculptures to survive.

Gerace is a stunningly well-preserved medieval town, high in the Aspromonte overlooking the Ionian sea above Locri. Visit late medieval San Francesco and an 11th-century cathedral built using columns from ancient Locri. Afternoon by the coast at Locri, where the archaeological site preserves the Greek theatre and a major sanctuary devoted to Persephone.

Drive to Altamura for a short visit and lunch before then heading to Bari Airport to catch a direct flight to London Gatwick, arriving c. 8.00pm (British Airways).