I live in South-East England – Reading, Berkshire to be exact, so not far from the start of the route in London. I have a friend who has bought a house in Puglia – the heel of Italy – and he has invited me to visit. I have done so already, in summer 2007 and then I travelled by train via Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, Florence and Naples (to tick off a few of the places in Spain and Italy I had never visited). I returned to the UK via Stuttgart to see another friend. Puglia is a stunningly beautiful, whitewashed part of Italy.