If you are planning your first visit to Florence, one of the most important decisions you will make is where to stay in Florence. You have lots of great options to choose from, from cozy boutique-style hotels, highly rated budget properties, luxurious 5-star hotels, family friendly apartments, and hotels with a view of Ponte Vecchio […]
Planning a trip to Tuscany? This guide covers everything you need to build the perfect itinerary, whether you have 3 days, 5 days, or a full week. How long should you spend here? Where should you stay? Should you rent a car? What towns are worth visiting? These are all questions that may be running […]
From world-famous cities like Florence and Siena to quiet hill towns and scenic drives through vineyard-covered hills, Tuscany offers a wide range of experiences, but deciding what to do (and what to skip) can be overwhelming. We’ve explored Tuscany on two very different trips: a one-week highlights tour with our kids and a longer 10-day […]
Planning a trip to Italy and only have enough time for one day in Florence? With a well-planned day, you can visit Florence’s top sights, including the Duomo, Michelangelo’s David, the amazing Uffizi Gallery, and Ponte Vecchio. Watch the sunset, stroll through Florence’s scenic streets, and enjoy views of the Florence Cathedral from a rooftop […]
Florence is not only filled with some of Italy’s most awe-inspiring sights, but it also makes a fantastic home base for exploring Tuscany and nearby cities. There is a long list of day trips from Florence, from quick visits to Tuscan hill towns to full day excursions to the Cinque Terre, Siena, and Pisa. Whether […]
Some cities in Italy overwhelm you with options. Siena does the opposite, and that’s exactly what we loved about it. The historic center is compact and entirely walkable, the main sights are clustered within easy reach of each other, and the city has a pace that makes it easy to slow down. The things to […]
Pisa and Lucca are two popular day trip destinations from Florence. Their close proximity to one another, small sizes, and handy train stations make them very easy to combine into one amazing day trip from Florence. We’ve visited both cities on separate trips to Italy. We stopped in Pisa while traveling by train from Florence […]
If you are planning your first trip to Florence, this Florence itinerary is perfect for you. With 2 days in Florence, you have just enough time to visit the highlights of this beautiful city. Tour the Uffizi Gallery, climb the dome of the Duomo, see Michelangelo’s David, stroll across Ponte Vecchio, and watch the sunset […]
Lucca is one of Tuscany’s most rewarding cities to visit. While Florence gets the crowds and Pisa gets the selfies, Lucca has a charm that’s entirely its own: Renaissance city walls you can walk or bike, medieval towers rising above the rooftops, and a piazza built inside a Roman amphitheater. What we loved most was […]
Home to the amazing Uffizi Gallery and Michelangelo’s David, famous piazzas and historic bridges, towers to climb, and of course, the Duomo, there are many wonderful things to do in Florence. Florence is a relatively small, compact city but there is a lot to do here. To get to everything on this list, it would […]
The Florence Cathedral, also called the Duomo di Firenze and Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore, is one of the most recognizable cathedrals in the world. A visit to this cathedral is more than just walking through the cathedral and seeing the dome. You can also climb Giotto’s bell tower, walk the stairs to the […]
Visiting a rooftop bar or two (or three!) is one of the best things to do in Florence. If you want drinks with a view of the Duomo, you have quite a few rooftop bars in Florence to choose from. In this guide, we cover the top picks and practical information so you can choose […]
There’s a moment on the train from Rome to Florence, about an hour in, where the landscape shifts from the flat Roman countryside to something greener and hillier, and you realize you’re already in a different Italy. We’ve made that journey more than once over six trips to Italy, and it never gets old. This […]
With one week in Europe, you have an infinite number of possibilities for coming up with your “perfect” itinerary. Do you dream of visiting world-class cities like Paris, Barcelona, or Venice? Or would you rather hike the Alps, go on a scenic train ride, explore the beautiful beaches and coastal towns in southern Europe, visit […]
We have been to Italy six times, and this route — Rome, Pompeii, the Amalfi Coast, Florence, Tuscany, the Cinque Terre, and Venice — is the one we recommend above all others for a first visit. We’ve traveled every stretch of it firsthand and refined the planning advice in this post trip by trip. What […]
Italy is one of the most photogenic countries in the world, and after six trips here, we’ve stood at a lot of viewpoints, from clifftop villages in Tuscany to the jagged peaks of the Dolomites to the canals of Venice at twilight. The views never get old. In this guide, we share 20 of our […]
Florence is one of Italy’s most popular cities to visit, especially for first timers. Not only is Florence the art capital of the world, it is a gorgeous city filled with world class art museums, towers to climb, great places to go shopping, and lots of beautiful viewpoints. Here is a list of the 10 […]
With 10 days in Italy, you have enough time for an incredible trip, but not enough time to see everything. That’s the good news and the hard news at once. Italy is enormous, wildly varied, and deeply worth savoring. The biggest mistake most people make when planning a 10-day Italy itinerary is trying to fit […]