Borgo Egnazia, Italy

Borgo Egnazia © Giorgio Baroni

Borgo Egnazia — a dazzling, white-limestone, village-like, 5-star golf and spa resort — is located in Puglia (aka Apulia), on the southeast heel of Italy’s “boot.” From Brindisi, where we arrived via Rome, it’s a 30-mile coastal drive north on a flat, two-lane autostrada bordering scraggy shrubs along the stark, rugged shores of the Adriatic Sea, windswept trees and occasional clusters of white houses with flat roofs. En route, we passed silvery-hued stretches of centuries-old olive groves which supply half of Italy’s olive production. The resort, a member of Leading Hotels of the World, launched in 2010, is reminiscent of an ancient, walled Apulian Borgo (village), complete with five restaurants and a traditional piazza.

La Corte, the spacious white-on-white main building, welcomes with a vaulted entry lined with baskets of seasonal fruits. It houses some resort restaurants, an indoor pool, the Vair Spa and 63 accommodations. Outside, narrow pathways lead to neighborhoods with multiple swimming pools: Il Borgo, with 92 casette (townhouses) and Il Ville, with its 29 two-story, three- and four-bedroom villas, each with private pools and gardens. La Fonte is ideal for families with young children, for whom a sandy beach is perfect. The traditional piazza, with its clock tower, also houses a building with two restaurants; one is also used for cooking classes. Chef adapts to children of any age, (a tween was far more adapt than I at crafting the orecchiette, the little ear-shaped pastas for which the region is famous).

The resort provides a child-sized restaurant, Da Frisella, and three clubs for kids to teens and welcomes youngsters to Sunday brunch at Cala Masciola Beach Club. (Car-crazy kids also love riding in the hotel’s vintage Fiat!).

The healthful Mediterranean diet is integral to the Puglian lifestyle and hospitality; it features local, seasonal ingredients; about 60 percent of the produce is home-grown, fish is caught in neighboring fishing villages; Podolica beef comes from Bari, nearby, and the house-made olive oil originates in the owner-family’s ancient groves. Local wines predominate — I mostly chose Primitivo, Negroamaro and Verdeca — though international options are available. At extravagant breakfasts, regional cheeses, local breads, house-made preserves, warm pastries and a juice bar are displayed on white-wood tables.

Borgo Kids Cook © Giorgio Baroni

There’s golf for adults and the spectacular Vair Spa, a 20,000-square-foot, two-level sanctuary where barefoot therapists, clad in Roman garb, offer personalized, olive-oil based services in 12 treatment rooms. There’s also a relaxation lounge, yoga studio and hydrotherapy pools.

On a daytrip, we visited Alberobello, a UNESCO World Heritage site in Itria Valley; this, one of the hilltop, medieval città bianche (white towns) is deservedly famous for its 1500 iconic trulli, the ancient cylindrical limestone houses with conical stone roofs, constructed without mortar, until 1797. And we lunched under a vaulted ceiling at Antiche Mura Ristorante — an authentic, family-owned fish restaurant — within the ancient walls bordering the sea in Polignano a Mare, a coastal town with a 10^th-century Romanesque church and a miniscule, white pebble beach.

Introducing the next generation to ancient cultures is a win-win adventure for all.