Piccolina in Puglia
Bringing your baby to Italy
It has been very cold in NY so I thought I’d reflect on warmer times in Puglia.
She sleeps on us all the time, why would we spend another $200 each way on a bassinet? We don’t need a bassinet. We were bringing our 4 1/2 month old Cecilia to Italy, heading back to Puglia, home of one of the best vacations I’ve ever been on and Italy’s bread basket.
Puglia is “choose your own adventure”, depending on what you are interested in, you could be touring an ancient hillside town, eating urchin at a rustic seaside restaurant, cutting into a fresh wheel of ricotta at a farm, or dipping into crystal clear Caribbean style waters at a chic beach club. You’re the star of the story!
As it turns out, Cecilia didn’t sleep on the plane. She moaned, cried and wriggled for 9 hours straight, resulting in a 9 hours pilates class for Tiff in a constant effort to give me some amount of sleep because I was going to be driving.
We made our way to the very small town of Lizzanello outside of Lecce to our Airbnb. It was a very charming space with a plunge pool and a nice open courtyard. We collapsed into sleep to try to recoup the previous night.
We found our way to a little beach club the next day to take some R&R. Cecilia continued to remain out of sorts with long protracted moaning and not too much napping. Like any modern parent, we Googled “baby jet lag” and got the sense that this was normal.
The next day we made our way to Monopoli to check out the Sam Youkilis 'Under the Sun' exhibition for the 10th anniversary of the International Festival of Photography and Art. Sam Youkilis creates dream short form videos of slices of life around Europe showcasing things like weavers in northern Vietnam, his home in Umbria, and sun kissed beach goers in Italy. It was great to see his work off the phone and at scale.
We made our way to Il Principe del Mare, a casual seaside restaurant, for lunch. Cecilia continued to softly moan. At the risk of sounding braggadocios, we have a chill-ass baby. Something was afoot. Tiff and I had lunch in shifts as we traded turns of beautiful soothing and making failed attempts at soothing our daughter.
Something was up.
Tiff smartly brought with us a grab bag of “just in case” items including the thermometer. Cecilia had a fever and we messaged our pediatrician hoping to navigate the 6 hour time difference. We got in touch and were advised to head to the hospital in Lecce, “just in case.” Emergency Rooms are chaotic spaces in the US and Southern Italy was no different. That stress was compounded by the fact that my Italian is okay for low-risk situations like a restaurant not navigating medical care. Cecilia needed a blood test. Watching a nurse try to eek blood from your screaming baby with no way to clearly communicate was heart breaking. All communication was hand written on paper and I personally had to run the blood to another floor for testing. Many many hours later, I was able to secure the results.
Our poor baby had an infection. She needed to start a course of antibiotics. Their preference was to keep her there for 3 days, but that was not happening. With our doctor’s permission, we took her home around 130am and tracked down the antibiotics at a pharmacy first thing the next morning. We love a tiny town, but Lizzanello turned out to be far too small even for us. There is nothing. Not even a gelateria! Tracking down basic groceries was tricky. Of course whenever we found something, it was still A+, from freshly baked focaccia to creamy burrata.
A day later, Cecilia was on the mend so we took a flyer and went out to Galipoli to meet our friend Alex for lunch. We seemed to be approaching normalcy and had a lovely lunch with crisp Italian wines and simply prepared pastas.
After lunch we made a play for the beach, but Cecilia started screaming bloody murder. Not so fast!
We got her home and resting. We had to eat to made an attempt at an early dinner in Lecce, but it was not to be. Cecilia cried harder than I can remember for hours on end.
The next day, we were worse for wear and made our way to Masseria Potenti, where our friend Victoria was married. Masserias are essentially old fortresses that have been turned into hotels. Potenti practiced “zero kilometer” cuisine, where all the food was made onsite, including homemade pastas, olive oil, and wine.
After lunch Cecilia started up again and I looked at Tiffany and we both thought this was it. We’d have to pull the rip cord. Even though she no longer had a fever, she wasn’t going to improve and we needed to swallow the costs of ending our trip early.
We were on the ropes.
Tiffany reached in to her bag of tricks one more time and pulled out the “gas drops.” Maybe the antibiotics were working, but they were terrorizing Cecilia’s tiny stomach!
Within 15 minutes of taking the gas drops, Cecilia was smiling and playing in the pool. I know Italy loves its miracles, but this was one for the books. Our sweet darling angel baby had returned.
The vacanza was saved!
From there on out it was smooth sailing. We enjoyed slow beautiful gourmet dinners of fresh pasta and vegetables in the courtyard, knowing our baby was sleeping less than hundred feet away.
We swam at glorious beach clubs with crystal clear waters and Aperol spritzes you ordered on your phone. Alex joined us at the masseria after our full throated endorsement. She and Tiff went hog wild in Grottaglie, the “ceramics town” of Puglia. I enjoyed an ice cold Peroni and a normal acting baby.
So it was a tale of two Puglias. Two adventures. The first half we were down bad, chasing down missing blood results, trying to understand the dosage for Italian paracetemol, hand mixing antibiotics, arriving at boarded up markets looking for food.
The second half was gorgeous meals thoughtfully prepared by a charming family, langorous days at beach clubs, artisanal ceramics, and lots of laughs.
We flew back in good spirits and you best believe we bought the damn bassinet.
Til next time.
This is simultaneously the best travel writing and the most harrowing parenting story I've read in a while. The whiplash from "Caribbean-style beach clubs!" to "running blood samples through a foreign hospital at 1am" is REAL. Props to both of you for not just immediately flying home after the ER. And honestly, Tiffany pulling out those gas drops like a magician is the kind of clutch problem-solving that deserves its own Substack. So happy Cecilia let you have the second half. You earned every single spritz. (Also: bassinet vindication is so sweet.)
Loved this Gabe! My wife and I are planning a 10 day international trip (maybe Japan) tonight for our 3 month old son. This was fascinating to read the trials and tribulations of an international trip.