Autumn Fai Days

The Autumn Fai Days are tinged with the colours of the mild season, with the eagerly awaited openings of many private palazzos, historic gardens and places that are not usually accessible in the city of Lecce, thanks to Fai volunteers and the "Apprentice Tour Guides" from local schools. The city's historical sites include the Church of Saints Niccolò and Cataldo, one of Lecce's most beautiful but lesser-known sacred buildings, with its medieval features, bell gable, chiselled stone, rose window and hanging arches, 16th-century cloister, well with twisted columns and Baroque altars. The abbey of Cerrate is also revealed, the eastern soul of the Salento, a melting pot of cultures and religions, a scriptorium and cultural centre, then a flourishing and productive masseria. Cerrate is narrated in its centuries-old history, admiring the portal where the cycle of the Virgin's life is sculpted, the cloister with its small columns with all different capitals and the 16th-century well with the sea monster dominating it. Visits then extend to other buildings that are usually inaccessible.