We want to rent a car in Florence and drive for a week around Tuscany. Looking at the autoeurope.com website, there are a number of places in Florence to pick up the car. We will have been in Florence for a couple of days, so we won't be at the airport. Any suggestions as to which locale is best, mainly to avoid driving in the city of Florence more than we have to?
Posted by
US Pacific Northwest
10344 posts
You will want to avoid picking up a rental car anywhere in the historic core area of Florence. The subject has been much discussed here recently, you can retrieve these discussions by using the search box in the upper right corner of this webpage. My suggestion would be to pick up a rental car as far from the historic core area of the city as you can conveniently reach; and to not drive into the core area after you pick up the rental car.
Posted by
Portlandia
3313 posts
Several of the agencies Autoeurope represents have offices on the Borgo Ognossanti which is away from the historic center but walkable from there. It's not difficult to drive out of town from there. If you decide to pick up your car there, print out driving directions from www.viamichelin.com.
Posted by
Tulsa, OK, USA
126 posts
I'm feeling a little contrary again, but we (2 women) did rent a car from Hertz, just a few small blocks from the Santa Maria Novella (SMN)train station. I must admit it was an experience getting out of Florence, but we just rolled down are window asked for help when we lost our way, and some guy just said follow me and we did. He led us south out of Florence on to the A-1 and pointed when we got to the exit to Certaldo. I wouldn't want to be driving into Florence and trying to figure things out on my own. However, when you are leaving Hertz, they will give you instructions, and you will at least be headed in the right direction. We just made a wrong turn. Oh well, we laughed about it for days and we did get where we were going, just not by the most direct route.