I will be in Italy the first week in March with my 20 yr old daughter who is studying abroad in Florence. She decided that she doesn't want to do the heavy touring like seeing museums etc when I am there since will be doing a lot of that all semester. She would like to do more strolling in town, wine tasting, great food, cooking classes, nice scenery. We don't want beaches as we are from Florida so we have that all the time. We have 6 nights. Can you recommend where to go to satisfy what we are looking to do. We do not want Rome or Venice bc been there several times. I hav been reading about 1. Tuscay area (maybe San Gimingnana, Voterra, Luca, Siena, Montepulciano, & Montalcino 2. Milan & Lake Cumo 3. Bologna but I don't understand if there are nearby places or is this a place to do 6 days 4. Switzerland. We are open to flying or taking train but do not want to rent a car a drive. Any budget is fine, lookiing to make it special so don't have a limit. Do you recommend either of these areas for what we want to do and if so what exact towns or villages and how many nights at each place. Or if there is another place please recommend. Please teach me as I really appreciate your help. Just to clarify...we are looking to sleep other places during the 6 nights, not in Florence.
Posted by
Arizona
128 posts
Places to experience are endless. Check out Cortona. We stayed at Villa Marsilli and they have cooking classes. The town is lovely for strolling with several tasty restaurants. Cortona is right next to Umbria so you could venture somewhere there too.
Posted by
Irving
3252 posts
Are you sleeping in Florence at all? If so, both Lucca and Siena make great day trips from Florence. For the rest of Tuscany, you need a car.
A direct train from Florence (Firenze SM Novella station) to Lucca takes 1h 30m: https://www.trenitalia.com/en.html. To get to and from Siena take a direct bus (1h 15m). The train to Siena takes longer and is located outside Siena’s city center but the bus will drop you off in the center.
Florence is a great jumping off point to visit Milan and Lake Como. You could sleep in Milan and take a day trip to Varenna and Bellagio or sleep in Varenna or Bellagio.
Bologna is also convenient to reach from Florence. Switzerland though is the outlier so I would stick with sleeping in IT the whole time.
Posted by
Chicago
8577 posts
If you can rent an apartment in a place like Montepulciano with parking and drive around Tuscany. We have done that several times and it can't be beat. If you don't want to drive then think about places with good train connections or bus connections. The three best ones near Florence are Bologna, Siena and Luca. And from Siena you can get to San Gimignano pretty easily by bus.
Posted by
Saint Paul, Minnesota
1586 posts
If you have not been to Siena yet, that's where I would go and stay for all 6 nights --- we have spent 6 nights in Siena in early April in two different trips and would love to spend at least another 4 nights there. Daytrips to Lucca and other nearby towns.
Most recently, we spent 4 nights in Ferrara, which is only a bit more than an hour by train from Florence. My husband took a cooking class there with a group of friends who live there and get together to cook in one of their apartments whether a tourist joins them or not. It was a different kind of cooking class than he's taken before and he really enjoyed it. They also recommended restaurants for us. From Ferrara, you can easily take the train to Bologna one day and then on another day visit Modena or Parma or go on a tour to see a cheese factory. Lots of cooking classes in Bologna, too --- I can find out for you which ones my husband did last December. One nice thing about Ferrara and also Bologna/Moden/Parma is that you can enjoy a different cuisine from Tuscany's. Another is that there will not be the crowds of tourists --- these places have much to see and do, but just not the blockbuster famous sites that Florence and other places in Tuscany do.