next holiday lined up, a family villa just south eat of lucca, back end of august (yes i know itll be VERY busy).  we’re usually greek beach lovers but a quick google of the nearest beaches and ‘beach clubs’ here has put us off that idea, they look awful!

so….. relaxing will be by the villa pool, the days out, well, thats where you come in.  i know nothing about the area other than the leaning tower of pisa, cinque terre (too busy?), a day in florence maybe, day in siena, some thermal baths at montecatini maybe…..

hoping to have a car, so any suggestions for nearby villages, eateries, things off the tourist track that only singletrackers know about…. 😉

thanks for any suggestions.

Depending when in August you could see the Palio in Sienna.

And Bagni di Lucca

Cinque Terra well worth it imo – busy but still special. Walk between them and train back. Leaning tower worth it too (book in advance I think, I went in October and didn’t need to). Sienna is lovely, I didn’t bother with Florence .

I cycled from Sienna to Pisa via Volterra and other villages, that was lovely, and would be easy with a car. The coast is meant to be grim, I avoided.

Lucca is pretty and great for wandering around too

Lucca is nice and, being flat, is cycle (for transport) friendly. Cycling around the city walls seems to be the thing. In the town, the market place is oval as it was the Roman amphitheatre.  There’s Puccini music somewhere all summer.  The Tuscan Food Market in Lucca did a good lunch

There’s more to Pisa than the leaning tower – the duomo and other parts of the Campo dei Miracoli are with a look. You don’t say who’s going, but Italian churches often have a good collection of relics (eg phials of blood, fore-arms, fingers of saints) which seems gruesome to those of us who grew up in Protestant-land – our son was shocked and fascinated. Also, in Pisa, is Keith Haring’s last work – a mural near the railway station.

Or… Seek out ridgeline and go for a ride…

As above. Get up into the Garfagnana. It’s sort of like Italian Wales, in that it has wooded valleys with little villages strung along them, dams and mountain streams, but it also has beautiful weather and pizza restaurants.

Lucca is a great place to visit.

There’s also a lot of old hill towns in the area: Volterra (Roman ruins, alabaster works); San Gimignano (tall towers); Vinci (Leonardo da Vinci museum).

My sis and BIL spent a week in Lucca and absolutely loved it.

Depending when in August you could see the Palio in Sienna.

we’re a few days too late.  also found out nick cave will be playing a couple of weeks before we go, gutted :-/

And Bagni di Lucca

pencilled in, thanks.

Cinque Terra well worth it imo – busy but still special. Walk between them and train back.

so train over car then?  is there any reason you suggest a train back if we’ve got a car?  ive read you cant drive into them, but id also guess a train wouldnt go much further than a car anyway?

Lucca is nice and, being flat, is cycle (for transport) friendly. Cycling around the city walls seems to be the thing. In the town, the market place is oval as it was the Roman amphitheatre.

good call, bikes will be easy to hire then yep?  and is it easy enough to bike round the streets and alleyways too, stopping off at cafes and locking up outside?  no theft?  or would a bike just be for going round the walls?

You don’t say who’s going, but Italian churches often have a good collection of relics (eg phials of blood, fore-arms, fingers of saints) which seems gruesome to those of us who grew up in Protestant-land – our son was shocked and fascinated. Also, in Pisa, is Keith Haring’s last work – a mural near the railway station.

bit of a mix going really, my bro is very cultured and would enjoy that sort of thing, me and the missus the opposite really, dont know our history and would just appreciate the look of a place rather than know the history behind it.  and goes without saying, ive never heard of keith haring 😀

Seek out ridgeline and go for a ride…

cant see me getting a ride in, i rarely ride here these days and my fitness wouldnt cope with big tuscan hills 🙂

Get up into the Garfagnana. It’s sort of like Italian Wales, in that it has wooded valleys with little villages strung along them, dams and mountain streams, but it also has beautiful weather and pizza restaurants.

ive read a few recommendations on garfagnana, sounds like a pleasant pootle around.  any recommendations on particular routes/villages, or is it just a case of keep driving and stop when you see somewhere you like?

keep em coming.  be also be interested in places around pisa/florence/siena if we have a day out in each.

thanks a lot

The Cinque Terra train line runs along the coast & connects the villages/towns. It runs regularly & you are going to use it at some point, so if you can do the whole journey on it it may be easier. Personally I wouldn’t walk between the villages, they are not far apart but it would reduce the amount of time you would have to look around each village/town. Well worth a visit though. I wouldn’t bother with Florence in the tourist season, its just too busy. Pisa for a day out (we made the mistake of using it as a base for 5 days). I think we enjoyed Lucca most of the cities/towns we visited.

You are right in the heart of it there. Beautiful. I’m jealous.

Lucca is a walled town and worth a mooch about. As others above you’ve got Pisa, Sienna, Florence all in spitting distance.

You have to do the ‘square of miracles’ at Pisa to see the Dome, Cathedral and Leaning Tower. Then take a walk through the town towards the river. The restaurants right outside the square are tourists traps, the ones down by the river better value and less pricey.

Florence is great. The Uffizi museum usually has a big queue. My recommendation would be to walk over the Ponte Vecchio (Old Bridge with buildings on it) then up to the Piazza Michelangelo which has the postcard views over the entire city.

Beachwise the whole Carrara / Massa / Viareggio is a long stretch. Very commercial but if you fancy a day at the beach…

Portovenere is a little seaside town on the way to Cinque Terre that’s nice. Also worth a visit is the ‘Cave di Marmo’. The marble quarries in the mountains above Carrara. Cheap marble ornaments / chessboards etc!

Have a great time!

Most of the coast is indeed grim, but go south of Pisa on the coast road to Tirrenia. The beaches are (or were when I lived there back in the 80s) mostly private or pay on entry, but there’s a municipal beach and iidont known whether it’s still there or not, but we  went to the American beach occasionally. You had to show a passport and change money into dollars, but it was good fun in a little slice of America abroad kind of way.

Cinque Terre – I got a train there and my memoory is that taking a car in isn’t easy/encouraged. Shouldn’t be difficult to find out. Maybe not walk between all the towns but the walking is part of what is special, and I wouldn’t say you need to see all 5 towns. There’s a hidden beach between 2 of them but I couldn’t find it.

I’d second Volterra and San Gimignano.

I have family just South of Livorno, and there are some sketchy rocky mtb routes around the area if you’re able to get a pass – have a look on Trailforks around the coast by Calafuria

https://www.trailforks.com/trails/map/?lat=43.471852&lon=10.339408&z=13&m=trailforks

I’ve only been to Florence once, it was in August and there’s no way I’d go back. Horrible place, there are far nicer cities to visit. Sienna is lovely.

Another vote for Lucca, Sienna <span style=”display: inline !important; float: none; background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: ‘Open Sans’; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22.4px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;”>San Gimignano </span>and Cortona (if you end up travelling SE quite a way)

re <span style=”display: inline !important; float: none; background-color: transparent; color: #222222; font-family: ‘Open Sans’; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22.4px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;”>San Gimignano in August, whilst very lovely it was baking hot, to the extent that we were worried about the kids getting sun stroke. It’s position on the hill and the tall buildings seemed a massive sun trap and we struggled for ages to find a grocery shop selling water away from the main tourist shops.</span>

Cinque Terre is beautiful but also extremely crowded  on high season, have been there few times and didn’t enjoy visits in August.

If you head to Garfagnana go and have look at Vagli Sotto, it has a dam and a lake  Lago Di Vagli, at the bottom of the lake is a village that was depopulated when the dam was built.  They empty the dam every couple of summers and you can visit the abandoned village.

Should you want to hire a bike, up the mountain from Vagli Sotto is a village called Roggio, the hotel there (only 1 in the village) hires bikes and caters for all fitness levels.

If you drive from Pisa to Lucca on the old road that goes under the mountain there is a great restaurant just before the tunnel, doesn’t look anything special but does traditional food, doesn’t have a menu and is cheap.

The drive from Castlenuovo to the coast at Forte de Marmi is rather spectacular, nice beaches but busy and expensive.

Oh, if you go to Florence, then do not get confused between porchetta and lampredotta.

You have to do the ‘square of miracles’ at Pisa to see the Dome, Cathedral and Leaning Tower. Then take a walk through the town towards the river. The restaurants right outside the square are tourists traps, the ones down by the river better value and less pricey.

Florence is great. The Uffizi museum usually has a big queue. My recommendation would be to walk over the Ponte Vecchio (Old Bridge with buildings on it) then up to the Piazza Michelangelo which has the postcard views over the entire city.

excellent, thats just the sort of thing im after, thanks.

Beachwise the whole Carrara / Massa / Viareggio is a long stretch. Very commercial but if you fancy a day at the beach…

Most of the coast is indeed grim, but go south of Pisa on the coast road to Tirrenia. The beaches are (or were when I lived there back in the 80s) mostly private or pay on entry, but there’s a municipal beach and iidont known whether it’s still there or not, but we  went to the American beach occasionally. You had to show a passport and change money into dollars, but it was good fun in a little slice of America abroad kind of way.

sounded interesting so i googled and found it.  an army beach or something?  google images show it to be as busy and ‘beach clubby’ as the others so probably dont think we’ll bother with beaches now 🙂

Portovenere is a little seaside town on the way to Cinque Terre that’s nice. Also worth a visit is the ‘Cave di Marmo’. The marble quarries in the mountains above Carrara. Cheap marble ornaments / chessboards etc!

noted, thanks.

Maybe not walk between all the towns but the walking is part of what is special, and I wouldn’t say you need to see all 5 towns. There’s a hidden beach between 2 of them but I couldn’t find it.

sounds like a challenge, im up for that.  probably find it and discover its got another beach club on it! 😀

If you head to Garfagnana go and have look at Vagli Sotto, it has a dam and a lake  Lago Di Vagli, at the bottom of the lake is a village that was depopulated when the dam was built.  They empty the dam every couple of summers and you can visit the abandoned village.

Should you want to hire a bike, up the mountain from Vagli Sotto is a village called Roggio, the hotel there (only 1 in the village) hires bikes and caters for all fitness levels.

than you, something else to look into.  not sure mrs ex-punk would fancy biking at all but you never know…..

If you drive from Pisa to Lucca on the old road that goes under the mountain there is a great restaurant just before the tunnel, doesn’t look anything special but does traditional food, doesn’t have a menu and is cheap.

ive looked on the map and cant see where youd mean, any chance of pinpointing that for me please mossimus?

Oh, if you go to Florence, then do not get confused between porchetta and lampredotta.

haha talking from experience?  had to google both of those and cant see me making that mistake, neither appeal to me.

thanks

There’s a good reason for recommending the train OP, it’s really cheap. Less than €9 per adult Pisa to Florence one way. check the Trenitalia site for fare details.

thats a very good shout mate, you prompted me to go on the trenitalia site and put in a few journeys in august as a trial.  very encouraging results.  lucca to pisa about 4 euro per person, 12ish to florence and siena……

only slight problem is we’re just outside lucca and would probably need taxis into lucca each time to catch the train, also the initial and final airport transfers, plus the razzing about in the hills above lucca and various other places….

need to do some sums, but thanks for putting the options in my mind.

Lucca is a beautiful town for the day, a restaurant recommendation is Trattoria Da Giulio. An ex colleague of mine, his wife’s family’s friends own (owned? maybe, it was some years back) it and it’s proper Tuscan food, bean stews, with pork and lentils and very simple but authentic. A bit away from the main spots (Lucca’s not huge though so only 5 mins walk) but full of locals rather than tourists.

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g187898-d1161672-Reviews-Da_Giulio-Lucca_Province_of_Lucca_Tuscany.html

Loads of other good advice above – I love Volterra (but careful of vampires) and San Gim, there’s also a lovely little town Certaldo a bit closer to Lucca than these. The ‘new’ town’s a bit ‘pah!’ but don’t let that put you off, get the funicular railway (or walk, it’s not far ) up to the old town (Certaldo Alto) for some very nice but relatively inexpensive restaurants tucked into the little courtyards. Don’t go into the first one you see (not that it’s not good) but walk around and see if any others take your fancy before deciding.

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g528748-d2343851-Reviews-Certaldo-Certaldo_Tuscany.html

And if you go to Florence book Uffizi tickets in advance so you can jump the queue. Worth doing if the only thing you see is David – utterly breathtaking.

definitely look at using trains where possible……. just to avoid the frustration of driving and parking in these towns. Volterra was the worst for me – I dropped the family off to start exploring and it took me best part of an hour to get into a car park. Where Volterra is a hill town the nearest railway is 10k’s away, but I’d still use the train (or drive) to Volterra-Saline and get a bus in.  Def look at for Florence, Pisa wasn’t too bad, Siena 50/50, we got parked easily but quite a way from the centre.

And watch the cost of ice creams close to Siena Campo……. cost me nigh on £30 for 4 (but they were fabulous and the server was perfection in female form so i couldn’t argue, I could barely speak)

sounded interesting so i googled and found it.  an army beach or something?  google images show it to be as busy and ‘beach clubby’ as the others so probably dont think we’ll bother with beaches now 🙂

Theres a vast American airbase at Livorno. It’s theirs . The coast is unremarkable, and I suspect most of the beaches are manmade. The fact that there are beaches at Marina di Pisa confirms this, as there weren’t any when I was there, just a massive boulder breakwater. It was great for snorkelling though!

I used to go there loads when I was a kid, went back a couple of years ago with the Mrs and it’s still ace.

thoroughly recommend hiring a road bike, there’s some ace road cycling round there. Also keep an eye out for Mario Cippolini, he owns one of the bike shops and seemed happy to chat to a fanboi while my mrs and MIL couldn’t understand why I was so excited….made my holiday did that..

Can highly recommend Ristorante Giglio in Lucca. We got married in Lucca 11 years ago and had the wedding meal at this restaurant, then me n the wife stayed there over night before going off to Amalfi.

Stunning city.

If you hire a road bike give me a shout and I’ll see if I can get the route for the trip into Lucca that the Giro uses. It’s quite a big hill to get over.

got a few days off now, so just bumping this for more suggestions. ill spend a bit of time going through all the links, google mapping the recommendations, towns, restaurants etc and saving them on my phone, just so we’ve got some idea of how to spend our days.

think the latest and more cost effective plan is to train it most places and taxi it to train station.  bro will have a hire car too so we can share it about for razzing in the hills and to the places the trains dont go.

do the buses generally follow just the main routes, or might there be local buses nearby do you think that go from village to village?

thanks

San Miniato Alto (just south of Lucca) is a beautiful little village with a great gelatoria and cute little shops. The tower there is apparently meant to be from Dante’s inferno, and has amazing views over the tuscan countryside (i got married in San Miniato so am biased).

There is also a really nice organic vineyard in San Miniato (agrisole SSA) who do great tastings – just make sure you aren’t the desigated driver as we got really sloshed there.. they do charge (10 euros pp) but each wine was paired with food.

San Gimignano just down the way is also really nice…..

We were there for a week last year and whilst Lucca is great, it is a real tourist mecca.  As others have said, get out into the Garfagnana; the scenery there is absolutely stunning.  I hired a (road) bike from Chrono in Lucca.  Really nice bunch and very helpful.  Then drive up to Castiglione di Garfagnana which is a gorgeous hill town and do a loop up to San Pellegrino in Alpe and back via Passo delle Radici.  San Pellegrino in Alpe is tough with the 2km up to the village being particularly brutal.

all duly noted, thanks.

just been plotting all of these suggestions on the map to see if theyre better by car or train.  the biggies, pisa, florence and siena will be train, but im struggling a bit with the others, the bits north of lucca (garfagnana area, bagni di lucca) and the southern bits, (san gimignana, volterra, san miniato etc).

theyre all perfectly doable by car, but to compare, itd help if there was a trenitalia station map, a bit like londons tube say.  i havent got a clue what any stations are called near these places and how far away theyd would actually be to make public transport feasible.

is there any such thing for trains or buses to make life a bit easier for me?

thanks

I’ve been to Lucca in August and it was incredibly hot…there was no way I could have ridden far on a bike even when very fit.

Temperatures – yes, beware – we were in Siena last August; on the day we left to head to an Agriturismo in the hills, the temperature according to our car was 43 Celsius and it stayed similarly hot for the rest of the week.  We spent a lot of time seeking shade – still very enjoyable though (visited Monteriggioni, Certaldo, San Gimignano, Volterra, Lucca and Florence – I think we’ve ‘done’ Tuscan hill towns now!)

For railway directions, would rome2rio help?  Or is that only really useful for longer journeys?

https://www.google.com/search?q=tuscany+train+map&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-ab

Sadexpunk you may need to Google train journeys as some routes are not operated by Trenitalia. The machines at the station don’t do each others routes either!! SLightly less joined up than our system but still cheap.

Sadexpunk you may need to Google train journeys as some routes are not operated by Trenitalia. The machines at the station don’t do each others routes either!! SLightly less joined up than our system but still cheap.

ah thanks, didnt realise that, makes it a bit more complicated :-/

Temperatures – yes, beware – we were in Siena last August; on the day we left to head to an Agriturismo in the hills, the temperature according to our car was 43 Celsius and it stayed similarly hot for the rest of the week.

43!!  i can cope with that on a breezy beach, but i may struggle with that in the ickle towns and villages!

https://www.google.com/search?q=tuscany+train+map&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-ab

thats the pic ive already seen, doesnt show there to be many train lines at all so maybe thats just it.  i was hoping for a list of all the smaller stations the trains stop at but cant seem to find one.

For railway directions, would rome2rio help?  Or is that only really useful for longer journeys?

wow, great site thanks.  never heard of it before but i think ill be using that a lot more from now on.  its helped me find out which bus routes nearest too, really helpful site.

thanks again.

well we’ve been back for a couple of weeks now, had a great time there, we’re now confirmed lovers of italy.  absolutely beautiful place.

stayed in a villa 20 mins or so outside lucca (san ginese), did the obligatory trip to pisa (tower area was lovely, didnt think much of the city itself) and had a few days exploring lucca and loved it there.  i dont really do buildings but its hard not to be impressed with them there.

had a day out exploring pistoia which id also recommend.  taxi driver said that nobody ever goes there, he hadnt had one fare there all summer and only one or two last year.  cracking little place, maybe not quite as picturesque as lucca but still worth a visit and not so touristy.   did the zoo there too then went on a wine tasting afternoon in montecarlo.  twas a vineyard recommended by the driver again (he became a good friend whilst over there) with 8 or so bottles brought out with food each time, then a tour of the place.  absolutely stunning views.  driver then took us up to montecarlo town up the top of the hill where the views were even more stunning if that was even possible!!

had a drive to san miniato alto for the views and the ‘dantes inferno’ tower, but wasnt so impressed with that place.  could be cos most of it was shut for august which is common over there but there just didnt seem much to it.

thanks to you all for your recommendations, we’re going to try and keep hitting italy once a year now between our greek holidays 😀  already looking for next years villa, maybe try umbria or those trulli houses down in puglia.

cheers

Lucca is stunning. I got married there 12 years ago. Had our wedding meal at Ristorante Giglio and our wedding night at the hotel nearby. Happy memories.

Barga is definitely worth a visit and very welcoming if you have an och aye the noo accent , Florence but not in 36°, must go back out of summer season