Hi fellow travelers -
Has anyone done a tour of the Carrara marble quarries where Michelangelo picked out the marble for his masterpieces.
Rick says there is a tour and I was just wondering if anyone has done the tour. Any feedback and the web sites for the tour would be greatly appreciated. I'm thinking of trying to do a day trip from Florence. We're going to be there in December 2015.
Also, are there any other day trips from Florence that anyones taken and would like to give some feedback. Any suggestion would be sincerely appreciated! Thanks!
Jimmie from Texas
Posted by
San Francisco Bay Area (USA)
15166 posts
Posted by
Bay Area
3551 posts
My husband and i went without a tour. It was imp to me to see and experience the area of the famous carrera marble that i have been aware of since childhood. Realize that it is an active industrial excavation site. A quarry in the raw. I was ok with that and appreciated its natural apperance.
Posted by
San Diego
1540 posts
I went on a tour as part of a Rick Steves tour. I loved the scenery on the ride up the mountain, and then at the top, seeing white "mountains" of marble. The tour was very informative and I was amazed at how they used to cut the pieces out of the mountain with the old hand saws.
It was interesting to imagine many of the famous artist going there to select their marble.
You also see how the people lived up there and how HUGE the quarry is.
We saw several large truck taking marble down the mountain and imagined how they did that before trucks.
I would recommend a trip there.
Posted by
Boston
1698 posts
You'll have difficulty doing a Carrara tour as a day trip from Florence without a car, and December weather could be a limiting factor. The train station for Carrara is some distance from town so you'll need a tour that picks you up there as adding bus transfers will make it into a scene from Mission Impossible.