Martina Franca is a fair-sized town (population: 49,000) in the heart of Puglia, southern Italy. It has some ugly modern areas, but the town's jewel is its lovely historic centre, a memorable maze of winding alleys, where whitewashed simplicity sits side by side with baroque extravagance. The town is built on a hill in the green Valle d'Itria, the trulli area of Puglia, and it makes a good day trip if you are exploring the region or a pleasant stop-over on a tour. Martina Franca is an incredibly photogenic town, so come equipped to take lots of pictures: the narrow lanes that are so hard to photograph well in other Italian cities are here illuminated by whitewashed walls, pale stone and tiny open spaces
