The Lands of Fasano are a microcosm of great cultural and landscape value. The atmosphere that reigns around Masseria San Lorenzo Resort is something unique and unrepeatable elsewhere, the result of the great daily work of those who have preserved the beauty we have inherited over time.
The countryside is a forest of olive trees, the oldest in the world that hide ancient treasures: a Dolmen from the Bronze Age, the Archaeological Park of Egnazia, the largest in Puglia, rock villages that tell the story of peasant culture - Lama d’Antico and Lama del Trappeto - underground oil mills, Lombard temples and churches set in the rock with Byzantine frescoes. All reachable on foot or by bike along paths, sheep tracks and dirt roads that join the historical itinerary of the Via Francigena.
All this is combined with the historical and cultural heritage of the area, the traditions, rites, popular tales and customs of a community that has made hospitality and conviviality the true meaning of its life as a historical synthesis of Mediterranean value.
Everything around Masseria San Lorenzo Resort speaks of history and tradition and to tell it we need to rewind the narrative tapes back about four millennia. A few kilometers away from the masseria, between the seaside villages of Savelletri and Capitolo, stood Egnazia, founded in the Bronze Age, today a National Museum and Archaeological Park, the largest in Puglia. Here history is the main protagonist, in a timeless place where you can admire the remains of a thriving and lively city and also the authentic stretch of the Via Traiana, today the Francigena of the South.
Precisely this ancient road, which has become a Cultural itinerary, will accompany you to discover the cultural heritage of the Lands of Fasano, on a real journey through time. Along the coast the fishing villages of Savelletri and Torre Canne, inland Lame and rock settlements including Lama d’Antico with its churches carved into the rock decorated with sumptuous frescoes, and Lama del Trappeto, the place of the historical representation of peasant civilization on the occasion of the Christmas holidays, the Living Nativity of Pezze di Greco.
Going up the hill, hidden among the branches of the olive trees, the Dolmen of Montalbano, a pagan symbol dating back to the 2nd millennium B.C., a few meters from the medieval Church of San Pietro in Ottava, another icon of the area, with its naves and frescoed apses. On the hill, a panorama as far as the eye can see: Laureto, with its biodiversity, Selva di Fasano with the Moorish-style Villa Minareto and Cocolicchio, with its village of Trulli represent a true synthesis between history and nature of which Fasano is authentic keeper.
The naturalistic area in which Masseria San Lorenzo Resort is immersed is called “Piana degli Olivi Monumentali”, the largest concentration of thousand-year-old olive trees in the world. It is a real historical landscape that extends between the territories of Monopoli, Fasano, Ostuni and Carovigno.
The territory of the Piana is among the most picturesque in Puglia: the rust red of the earth, the dark green of the olive trees, the blue of the sea and the sky, all in a single glance.
Olive tree trunks are unique in shape and size; they twist on themselves, giving life to tortuous and majestic natural sculptures that can measure up to 10 meters in circumference. They produce an excellent extra virgin olive oil, the green gold of Puglia, and some of them still retain an ancient gem, the white olive, jealously guarded in the gardens of Masseria San Lorenzo Resort.
The precious cultural heritage of the Lands of Fasano is guarded and protected by the Dune Costiere Regional Natural Park from Torre Canne to Torre San Leonardo. It is a protected natural area that extends for 1100 hectares between the territories of Ostuni and Fasano.
The park includes approximately 8 kilometers of coastline, protecting the indispensable and fragile coastal system, and extends towards the internal agricultural areas, occupied by ponds behind the dunes rich in Mediterranean scrub, centuries-old olive groves, blades, underground oil mills and ancient masserie.
The park area is characterized by a high diversity of environments to be protected: the beach, the dunes, the wetland behind the dunes, the fossil dunes, the blades and the centuries-old olive groves. In the protected area there are numerous natural habitats, some of which are at great risk of extinction and visit activities are carried out aimed at learning about the ecosystem to help preserve it together.
