In short. Puglia has two international airports — Bari, 8 km from the city, and Brindisi, 6 km — plus a smaller one at Foggia. You can also arrive by motorway, by train, by long-distance coach, or by ferry from Greece and Albania. Which you choose matters: the region is about 400 km long, and landing at the wrong end costs you a day.
This page is the short version of every way into the region, with a page of its own behind each one. If you read only one line: pick your airport by where you are sleeping, not by the fare.
By air — the two gateways
- Bari Karol Wojtyła, also called Bari Palese, about 8 km from the centre. The biggest and busiest airport in the region, and the right one for the Gargano, the Murgia, the Valle d’Itria, Polignano a Mare, Alberobello — and for Matera, just over the border in Basilicata.
- Brindisi Casale, the Aeroporto del Salento, about 6 km from the centre. The right one for Lecce, Gallipoli, Otranto and Santa Maria di Leuca.
- Foggia “Gino Lisa” — small, and useful for the Gargano and the north of the region.
Choose by where you are going, not by price. Landing at Bari for a holiday in the deep Salento adds around two and a half hours of driving each way. It is the most common planning mistake visitors make, and the fare difference almost never covers it.
Full detail, connections and the bus links from both airports: the airports of Puglia.
By car
Four motorways bring you in — the A14 from Bologna to Taranto is the main one — and from the exits a network of dual carriageways and trunk roads covers the region, including the SS16, which runs all the way from Padua to Otranto. Once here, a car is close to essential if you want to see more than the cities. Arriving by car.
By train
Trenitalia reaches the main stations on the Adriatic line. What most visitors do not know is the second layer: the local railways — Ferrovie del Sud Est, Ferrovie del Gargano, Ferrotramviaria Bari Nord, Ferrovie Appulo Lucane — which are how you reach the small inland towns without driving. Arriving by train.
By ferry
Bari and Brindisi are working passenger ports, connected to Patras, Corfu, Paxos, Kefalonia, Zakynthos and Albania — which is also the most interesting way to leave, for two or three days, in the middle of a holiday here. The Tremiti islands have their own boats. Arriving by ferry.
By coach
Long-distance buses reach Puglia from most of Italy and from beyond the border, in an average of five to eight hours depending on where you start. It is the cheapest way in. Arriving by coach.
By bike
Puglia has very little gradient outside the Murgia and the Gargano, which makes it unusually good cycling country, and there are bike-friendly hotels set up for it. Cycling in Puglia.
The one thing to sort out before you book. Decide the area first — the six areas are here — then the airport, then the flight. Puglia is not a city break with a hinterland: it is a long region where two towns 200 km apart can both be called “Puglia” and have nothing in common.
Where to go, and how the region is laid out: the map of Puglia.
