OSTUNI, Italy (CN) — It's a gorgeously hot July day but strangely quiet in this whitewashed ancient hilltop town that’s a favorite destination for tourists eager to savor its sweeping views of olive trees and the dazzling Adriatic Sea.
Idle restaurant waiters stand on sidewalks hoping to entice the occasional passersby indoors for a meal. Tourist guides who drive visitors through the narrow streets in three-wheeled vehicles have cut their prices. Rows of café tables in the main square are empty.
“Summer hasn't even started yet for Ostuni,” said Rinaldo Sorata, a 47-year-old tourist guide smoking a cigarette next to his three-wheeled Piaggio Ape and watching for potential clients. “By this time of the morning in previous years I'd have already done a full day's work by now.”
Like so many places in Europe, Ostuni's local economy depends on tourism and its citizens are desperate for a wave of sun-seekers to return this summer to spend money in restaurants, stores, hotels and cafés. In past summers, Ostuni's population of 30,000 swelled to 100,000 as people flocked in.
“Ostuni lives from tourism,” Sorata said. “We survive the winter months from what we make now.”
But this year is different. Tourists are only beginning to trickle in and many of the visitors are Italians. Slowly, faces from other parts of Europe are showing up but not nearly in the numbers people are used to here. Tourists from even farther away are an exotic species because Europe opened its airports to global travel on July 1. International travelers are largely limited to those coming from 14 countries where the coronavirus outbreak has been brought under control, and Americans are not among those being welcomed to Europe because the pandemic is accelerating in the United States.
“We're in a crisis here,” said Sante Milone, a 74-year-old retiree, sitting at a café table in the shade of a building with a few friends. He scanned the nearly empty Piazza della Libertà, the main square. “At least 300 people would have been here in the square last year,” he said. “People are hoping it gets better. That's the mood here.”
Residents said they struggled to make it through Italy’s long lockdown that began March 10 and was lifted May 4. It was a period when fear reigned: A few businesses, including a historic restaurant and a beloved pastry outlet, closed for good and many others worried they wouldn't survive. The unemployed multiplied and government help was insufficient, leaving many residents relying on charity, food handouts, community goodwill, family support and savings.
With the worst of the pandemic over in Italy, optimism is growing.
“In March, we thought we might not work at all this summer,” said Davide Francioso, the owner of a diving and summer sport shop. “We thought we'd have to close down for good.”
Day by day, the sound of tourists wheeling suitcases down Ostuni’s stone streets is becoming more common again, he said. Business isn't brisk, but it's picking up.
Still, this return of visitors may be too feeble for others, like Miriam Duque, a 50-year-old painter with a small gallery in a picturesque passageway where she displays her vibrant depictions of Ostuni and its brilliant blue skies. She has no taste for online sales and relies on attracting walk-by customers with her bursts of color. At the moment, there simply isn't enough foot traffic to pay the rent and bills, she said.
“We can't have any illusions,” she said. “It's going to be hard to stay open. I'd like to have the gallery forever.”
Ostuni and the surrounding region of Puglia have one big thing going for it: The dangerous coronavirus has mostly disappeared.
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