The sea in front of me was a whole spectrum of blues, from the crystalline aquamarine shallows where I could see golden sand below the lapping waves to turquoise and cobalt as the water started to become more than waist deep.
My eight-year-old son, Zac, dived straight in to snorkel, popping up every so often clutching miniscule scaphopoda “tusk” shells or a piece of bleached coral that he’d scooped up from the seabed below.
We’d walked here through a pine forest and dunes, past signs telling us what to do if we spotted a loggerhead sea turtle nest and how we can help the local Calimera Sea Turtle Rescue Centre (CRTM).
This was what Zac was hoping to spot underwater. But, as we were visiting in May before peak breeding season (typically June to September), I’d warned him that this was very unlikely.
The handsome stretch of sand was in Salento, Puglia, south of the popular Torre San Giovanni beach and around a 10-minute drive from the town of Ugento.
The beaches on this stretch of Ionian coastline have been given the nickname “the Maldives of Italy” owing to their powdery white sands and sparklingly clear water, and are great for families as they stay shallow for hundreds of metres.
Zac and my daughter May, 11, took full advantage of them.
Instead of a long-haul flight to the Maldives, we’d flown to Brindisi airport in a little over three hours from Manchester at a fraction of the cost.
Salento is the southernmost part of Puglia – the stiletto heel of Italy’s boot.
Puglia as a whole is becoming more popular with Britons and other international tourists – in 2024 there were 5.9 million arrivals to the region, an increase of 10.6 per cent compared to 2023.
But, even though we visited during May half term, we only saw a handful of other British families.
Our base was Vivosa Apulia Resort, an appealing all-inclusive option in the Litorale di Ugento Natural Park for families to see the best of this coastline.
Chief executive Damiano Reale told me that although the hotel has noticed a gradual increase in British guests discovering the hotel and the Salento region, he still considers Salento to be “one of Italy’s best-kept secrets, still untouched by mass tourism with unspoiled beaches, authentic culture, incredible food and wine, and a true sense of peace”.
The resort’s 333 bedrooms are split across 10 two-storey courts made out of the local caramel-coloured limestone, called tuff.
The grounds are home to three pool areas including one with water slides, as well as manicured gardens with fragrant rosemary bushes, lavender and purple flowering chives. And, while its own private stretch of beach can get busy at peak times, there are many spots in which to tuck yourself away, from hammocks in the pine forest to loungers. You don’t have to jostle for space.
One particularly popular spot in the morning is the coffee bar where, as part of the all-inclusive offering, espressos, cappuccinos, macchiatos and more are made to order, to accompany the vast breakfast buffet.
All-inclusive buffets can become a bit same-y after a couple of nights, but the focus on fresh, regional food here kept things interesting, with rotating food stations where chefs offered up local orecchiette pasta and oysters, made salmon and beef steaks to order and showed off local cheese-making techniques.
Its setting is what makes the resort particularly special, with paths through the pine-shaded Natural Park and a boardwalk to the beach through dunes covered in vegetation.
The children loved spotting lizards scuttling across the paths as we walked to the sea and had we been there between June and September would have enjoyed the weekly educational workshops in collaboration with CRTM to learn about the care of injured sea turtles and conservation.
While we stayed on the Ionian side of the peninsula, Salento has two coastlines and a good way to appreciate how calm and clear the seas are on this stretch is to visit the most southern point of Puglia, Santa Maria di Leuca, which the Romans called “De Finibus Terrae” (at the ends of the earth).
Here Punta Palascìa lighthouse marks the most easterly point of Italy and where the Ionian and Adriatic Seas meet.
The town itself is a lovely place to explore, with grand 19th-century villas looking out to sea across a palm-tree lined promenade and the Cascata Monumentale – an artificially made waterfall with almost 300 steps to walk up (with water only flowing on certain nights over summer).
To see both coastlines from the water, we took a boat trip with Alexander Leuca and sailed past beguiling sea caves – the children particularly enjoyed the description of Grotta del Diavolo (Devil’s Cave) on the Ionian side where strong winds from the west whip around it, apparently sounding like the moans of hell.
As soon as we headed round to the Adriatic coast, the sea became much choppier and darker in colour and the limestone cliffs more rugged – still beautiful but definitely not the Maldives.
On our way back to our hotel, we stopped to look at more of the Ionian coastline’s pretty beaches – the golden sand at Torre Mozza, which is named after the 16th-century defence tower behind it; a rocky viewpoint just before Santa Maria de Leuca with a backdrop of cacti, wildflowers and the cerulean sea; and Torre Vado, where the children requested to come back to the rock pools.
Later that evening, aperitivo in hand, I could see why Salento is often compared to the Maldives – beautiful beaches, a sense of unhurried escapism and interesting nature.
But with so many other places sharing the same moniker, this isn’t the reason to visit.
Come for the food (my children still talk about the fresh pasta and burrata), history, nature and unhurried escapism, whether you’re watching the sun set over the sea or dining al fresco.
