In Italy’s deep south, Puglia offers the great escape: a retreat from crowded beaches and the dusty sightseeing trail to a bleached land of olive groves and almost guaranteed sunshine. C heap flights to Bari and Brindisi have brought the heel of Italy in to play for a warm spring or autumn break or a blazing summer holiday off the beaten track of Mediterranean mass tourism. Little known to golfers even in Italy, Puglia is one of the most exciting recent additions to the Mediterranean golf scene. The climate offers a genuine year-round alternative to southern Spain and the Algarve; and with the addition of San Domenico, Acaya and Metaponto to the established championship venue of Riva dei Tessali, which hosts an annual PGA Challenge Tour event in May, Puglia has achieved critical golfing mass.

The courses are quite different in character but all are a pleasure to play for golfers of every standard, with a steady to stiff prevailing breeze adding to the challenge. Visiting all courses from a single base is possible, but for a short visit it makes sense to concentrate on San Domenico and Acaya on the Adriatic coast; or Riva dei Tessali and Metaponto on the Gulf of Taranto. Puglia confounds the notion that deprivation goes with the territory in southern Italy. A new generation of stylish farm-conversion hotels (Masserie) offers the last word in laid-back luxury; and a well-appointed trullo - a small house in the beehive-domed architectural style peculiar to the area around Bari – is the latest Italian must-have fashion accessory.

The pace of southern life may be slow, but there is plenty to see. From the Gulf of Taranto, the essential excursion is to the hill town of Matera, a honeycomb of troglodyte dwellings carved in the side of a ravine, where Mel Gibson took up residence to film his Passion Of Christ. On Puglia’s Adriatic coast, the delightful small town of Alberobello is the trullo capital, while Lecce is one of the great architectural treats of southern Italy, its town centre a showcase for the exuberantly decorative style known as Lecce Baroque. Otranto is a uniquely laid-back old walled port with palm trees and good beaches that attract the hardcore windsurf crowd in summer. Puglia is known for its clear sea and fine sand. Its beaches are more often backed by olive groves than hotel blocks and the ugly resort sprawl that scars much of Italy’s Adriatic coast.

3 nights B&B in the 5* Hotel Acaya with flights and car hire from £309