The first thing you need to talk about regarding this initial section of the Peuceta way is getting out of Bari: it’s a topic you’ll encounter easily when browsing the social networks of the Cammino Materano looking for information. One of the most recurring questions from aspiring walkers is precisely this: “Is it worth leaving Bari on foot or is it better to skip the suburbs starting to walk from Modugno?”. Even on the official website there’s a note indicating how it’s possible to skip the first 8 km of suburbs thanks to trains that go to Modugno (with FAL Ferrovie Appulo Lucane or with Trenitalia).

Reading here and there the comments of organizers and other walkers, it seemed to me I had understood that those 8 kilometers were so “ugly”, and therefore avoidable, mainly for two reasons: the first is that you cross an industrial zone aesthetically unpleasant, landscapingly very far from the habitat in which the walker who decides to abandon the burden of modern life wants to immerse himself in order to “immerse himself in nature”; the second is a significant presence of scattered trash along the road.

Nevertheless, I immediately ruled out the idea of the train to Modugno. In fact, from a philosophical point of view, it seemed to me a good idea to grit my teeth for those two hours or so, during which I would have crossed cemented areas and probably noisy, dodged the garbage I would find under my feet, looked down on my motorized and roaring fellow men while resolute and silent I would have begun to turn on my leg muscles step after step. All in the conviction that the moment of final abandonment of the urbanized part and entry into the countryside would be even more cathartic and rewarding. I told myself: if the walk is a metaphor for life, it makes sense to endure the brutalities until the glorious instant when I would come out to see the stars again.

I must admit that both on the aesthetic question and on the rubbish, I had made myself an idea worse than what I actually found. Of course, a suburb hardly reserves views worth photographing, and that was the case; but all things considered, Bari’s is not even that hellish. As for garbage, I feared that I would walk in the Apulian version of the “Land of Fires”, but here too I was proven wrong; perhaps having traveled and having seen suburbs really degraded the garbage I encountered in these first 8 kilometers almost negligible.

If I was able to evaluate these “brutalities” as a wholly acceptable compromise, it was less possible under another aspect: that of security.

The problem of those 8 km is another: there are stretches where you walk close to the guard-rail next to traffic, and there are roundabouts to overcome improvising pedestrian crossings that do not exist.

It’s one thing to make compromises with aesthetics, another is to compromise with safety, and my personal view is simple: it should be avoided.

I remember that at one point I was walking opposite to the vehicles, so as not to be surprised; inside a car there were two people, and the driver, spotting me, indicated me to the passenger, saying something. I will never know his exact words, but from the expression it must have sounded like: “but what is that idiot doing there on foot?”. Well, in that moment I felt myself a bit stupid; that kind of stupid on the edge of recklessness. That if a truck had run over me, someone could have commented “of course he was looking for it”.

To be clear: I didn’t feel in difficulty, nor was I afraid. But insecure, that yes, and I repeat that insecurity should be avoided whenever possible: at work as on a walk done for pure pleasure.

Summing up: if the weather is good, you are good walkers, you are agile, and maybe you’re bold, then let this description of mine not intimidate you: pay attention and enjoy the journey. But if your walk were a bit uncertain, if the weather conditions were not optimal (rain, mist, poor visibility or darkness), if you were walking with children or on a bicycle, in these cases there’s no doubt: it would become dangerous, and therefore leave the philosophy behind and take the train.

The first section of the Peuceta way, suburbs aside, flows quickly with slopes almost always imperceptible between olive trees and vineyards, on quiet interpoderal roads, for the most part asphalted.

There are two sites along the path that would be worth visiting, but unfortunately when I pass they are both closed. The first I encounter, with a short detour, is the Sanctuary of the Madonna della Grotta: there are no signs but only a locked gate and it seems that it opens in the morning only on Sunday, while on other days exclusively in the late afternoon (in reality other pilgrims will tell me that, when they passed an hour after me, they found it open). The second is the medieval Casale of Balsignano, which opens both morning and afternoon but only on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

When I arrive at Bitetto it’s just 11 and I celebrate with an onion calzone from the baker you meet just before crossing the gate of the town. I have a snack on the steps of the Cathedral while inside is Mass is taking place, with many people for a weekday Wednesday. In the square preparations are underway for something: I will discover later that the excitement is due to Santa Rita.

The overnight stay in Bitetto is at Ester’s house, the first of the stage referents I will meet along my Cammino Materano; the room she offers hospitality in (in “donative” mode, that is without a fixed price but with a donation at the guest’s discretion) is nice and overlooks a small courtyard hidden among the alleys a few steps from the cathedral.

Almost a legendary figure, Ester is widely preceded by her own fame thanks to the selfies that pilgrims publish on social networks: they photograph themselves in her company as if she were a living monument.

Extremely generous and empathetic, at lunchtime she suddenly appears in the small dormitory bringing me olives, tomato bruschetta and burrata as a gift; after a bit she returns with a taste of sausage, eggs and zucchini. Well deserved applause.

She invites me and the other guest to take a tour of Bitetto in the evening; while we walk to the Sanctuary of Blessed Giacomo she tells us the story of this 14th-century friar and of the bite with which two hundred years after his death a finger was taken from him.

Next to the Sanctuary is the “Museum of Dedication and Labor”: in the rooms where the convent once was, numerous environments of the past rural life have been reconstructed with furniture, tools, machinery and period clothes.

Since the friars have remained few and cannot manage the museum directly, they have left the keys to her and therefore if you want to visit it, contacting Ester is the only possibility you have.

When we pass again by the Cathedral, a procession in honor of Santa Rita is beginning; although not patron saint, it is a celebration much felt and you can understand it from the truly considerable number of sisters – in the hundreds, as far as the eye can see – all wearing the same black uniform.

For dinner I choose “Madre Terra”, a restaurant/pizzeria that in the pilgrim menu has the typical Spaghetti “alla san Giuannidd” and capocollo. Recommended.