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Olive groves and whitewashed masserie rolling down to the Adriatic on the Savelletri coast near Fasano, Puglia

Fasano: Gateway to the Luxury Coast

The gateway to Puglia’s luxury coast, the stretch of olive-grove country below Fasano, around Savelletri, holds the region’s most famous masserie, from Borgo Egnazia down. Add Italy’s biggest safari park, a Roman ruin by the sea and a cool green hill town, and it’s one of Puglia’s great bases, especially for families and a splurge.

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★ Gateway to the luxury coastBest for: familiesLuxury & honeymoonsCentral coast base

Where is Fasano?

On the Adriatic side of the province of Brindisi, between Monopoli and Ostuni, a few kilometres inland from the coast at Savelletri and Torre Canne. About 50 minutes from Bari airport and 40 from Brindisi, with its own station on the Bari-Lecce line. Fasano itself is a workaday town; the magic is spread around it, the masseria belt and beaches on the coast, the Zoosafari and Selva hill behind. A car is essential to string it together. Population ~38,000.

Three places to stay in Fasano that we would book:

Price per night for two, outside July and August: € under €100, €€ €100-200, €€€ €200-400, €€€€ over €400.

Borgo Egnazia

€€€€flagship resort

See prices

Masseria Torre Maizza

€€€€5-star

See prices

Masseria San Domenico

€€€€5-star

See prices

All the places we recommend

Best things to do in Fasano

Fasano is a town of about forty thousand people that almost nobody stops in, sitting between three things visitors do come for: a Roman city on the sea, a safari park with lions in it, and a strip of coast where the masserie cost more than anywhere else in Puglia. The town itself takes an hour, and everything else on this list is a fifteen minute drive from it. The order below is the one we would drive.

Piazza Ciaia in Fasano, the long stone facade of the Palazzo del Bali with balconies and flags, an orange corner house on the left, a three-arched portico on the right and an empty paved square — Piazza Ciaia at the quiet hour. The palace on the left belonged to the Knights of Malta.

1. Walk a Roman city at Egnazia, and get the opening hours right

Egnazia is the largest archaeological park in Puglia, and it is a whole town rather than a monument: the paved Via Traiana runs through the middle of it, with the market square, the amphitheatre, the baths and two early Christian basilicas on either side, and the sea at the end. The museum next door holds more than three thousand finds, including the Mosaic of the Three Graces and a marble head of Attis. The catch that most guides get wrong: the park is open mornings only, 9.30 to 13.30 all year, with last entry at 12.30. The museum runs longer, Monday to Saturday 8.30 to 19.30. A combined ticket is 10 euro, museum only 8 euro, and the first Sunday of each month is free.

The excavated streets and stone foundations of the Roman town of Egnazia standing in dry grass, with the sea on the horizon behind — A town, not a ruin: streets, a market square and an amphitheatre, with the sea at the end of them.

2. Drive your own car through the safari

The Zoosafari calls itself the second largest wildlife park in Europe, and whether or not you take that at face value, the format is the draw: you drive through the animal enclosures in your own vehicle, windows up, past lions, elephants, giraffes and zebras. The monkey village holds over three hundred baboons and you cross it in an armoured train, which is exactly as odd as it sounds. If you have arrived by train or bus, ask at the central till for the internal shuttle: it is 5 euro a head and has to be requested at least two hours before last entry. Adults 36 euro, children from four to ten 28 euro. Tickets are bought on arrival, no booking.

A dromedary leaning its head towards an open car window inside the Fasano safari park, other animals grazing on the dry ground behind — This is the whole point of the place: the animals come to the car, not the other way round.

3. Fasanolandia, which comes with the same ticket

The funfair sits next door to the safari and shares its gates: the Zoosafari ticket already includes entry to Fasanolandia, but not the rides, which are paid at tills inside. That distinction catches families out. What it does include is the Teatro Fantasy shows and the small museums. If you are travelling with children the sensible plan is the safari first thing, lunch, then the funfair in the afternoon when the animals have gone quiet anyway.

Fasanolandia funfair seen from above: red roller coaster loops in front of white tent roofs, a pool and a small castle with blue turrets among the trees — The other half of the same gate. Entry is included, the rides are not.

4. Go underground at Lama d’Antico

This is the one nobody in the search results mentions, and it is the best hour we spent near Fasano. A ravine cut into the rock holds a medieval cave village and its church, carved out whole with columns, arches and frescoed saints still on the walls. Entry is 6 euro, or 4 reduced, and visits are booked on 328 3597517.

Inside the rock church at Lama d Antico: arches and columns carved out of the living stone, with painted saints still visible on the frescoed wall to the right — Columns, arches and frescoes, all cut out of the rock rather than built.

5. Find the Dolmen di Montalbano among the olives

Two uprights and a capstone, standing in red earth between olive trees behind a dry stone wall, and old enough to make everything else on this list feel recent. It is a Bronze Age burial, and it is simply there, in the open, free, with no gate and no ticket office. You want a phone map and a bit of patience with the country lanes around Montalbano, which is the hamlet it is named after.

The Dolmen di Montalbano near Fasano: two upright stones carrying a large flat capstone, standing on red earth among olive trees beside a dry stone wall — No gate, no ticket, no sign worth the name. It is just standing in the grove.

6. Climb to Selva di Fasano when the heat is unbearable

The Selva is the hill village above the town, up in the pines, and in August it is the reason locals stop complaining about the weather: it is reliably cooler up there than on the coast, which is why the Neapolitan and Milanese families who summered here built the villas that still line its avenues. Come for the road up, the pinewood and the view, which on a clear afternoon takes in the whole olive plain and the Adriatic behind it. There is not a great deal to do beyond eat and walk.

The view from Selva di Fasano: pine and holm oak branches framing a wooded ridge, the olive plain spread out below and the Adriatic on the horizon — What you climb for: the plain, the greenhouses, the towns and the sea at the back of it.

7. Walk the old lanes for an hour before dinner

Fasano’s centro storico is small and it is not Ostuni: the lanes are lived in rather than let out, with washing above the doorways and the same three bars doing the evening. Start from Piazza Ciaia, where the Palazzo del Bali’ sits under its portico, and let the streets narrow behind it. The clock tower and the arches of the old Knights of Malta quarter are the landmarks, and you will have seen them all inside an hour.

A narrow paved lane in the old centre of Fasano, whitewashed and bare stone houses on both sides, a heavy dark wooden door on the left and lanterns fixed to the walls — Lived in rather than let out, which is the difference between here and Ostuni.

8. Eat fish at Savelletri, on the harbour it came into

Savelletri is the small fishing harbour that the luxury belt grew around, and it has kept the harbour: the boats still land here and several of the restaurants are a hundred metres from where the catch comes ashore. It is the most straightforwardly enjoyable evening in the area, and considerably cheaper than eating inside a masseria. Go early enough to walk the breakwater while the light is still on the water, then eat.

Savelletri from the air at sunset: white houses along the shore, the harbour behind its breakwater with fishing boats moored, and the sun low over the coast — A working harbour that happens to sit in the middle of the most expensive coast in Puglia.

9. See what the masseria belt actually looks like

The stretch between Savelletri and Torre Canne holds the highest concentration of five star masserie in Puglia, and Borgo Egnazia hosted the G7 summit in June 2024, which is the shorthand everyone now uses for it. You do not have to stay to see it: several of the properties open their restaurants, spas and beach clubs to non residents, and a drink at sunset costs a fraction of a room. If you are choosing where to sleep rather than where to look, our guide to the best masserie in Puglia covers the belt property by property.

Borgo Egnazia from above at golden hour, a dense cluster of pale stone buildings with towers, terraces and a bell tower, the flat coast and the sea behind — Built from scratch to look old, and convincing enough that the G7 was held in it.

10. Drive the olive roads between Fasano and Ostuni

The plain below the Selva carries some of the oldest cultivated olive trees in the Mediterranean, trunks the width of a car, and the roads between the dry stone walls are the best free thing to do here. Take the country lanes rather than the SS16 and give it an hour, ideally in the last light. Several of the farms along the way sell their own oil at the gate, which is the one souvenir from Puglia worth the space in a suitcase.

A narrow country road near Fasano running between low dry stone walls, lined with very old olive trees, the sea visible in the distance at the end of it — Trunks the width of a car, and a wall on each side. This is the drive, not the way to it.

Where to stay near Fasano

This is the single most concentrated stretch of luxury in Puglia. The coast below Fasano, around Savelletri, is where the region’s grandest masserie sit shoulder to shoulder, Borgo Egnazia, Torre Maizza, San Domenico, Torre Coccaro, all olive groves, beach clubs, spas and golf and the backdrop to celebrity weddings and, in 2024, the G7 summit. It’s the obvious base if you’ve come to Puglia for the famous resorts, for a honeymoon, or for a family splurge. You don’t have to spend a fortune: there are good-value masserie and agriturismi just inland, but a car is essential, and the headline places book out a year ahead for summer. Reckon on €250-700+ a night for the belt; far less inland.

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