Florence: 4+ days in a very nice apartment located halfway between the train station (SMN) and the Duomo. This apartment is in a great location with windows overlooking the Medici Chapel tower of San Lorenzo. This area is close to everything yet the apartment was quiet and tranquil. Again, requirements were for a 2 bedroom/2 Bath ‘lift-served’ apartment and this one ticked the boxes. It was well equipped with absolutely huge bedrooms. Each bedroom had a (European) Queen-sized bed, wardrobe, dresser AND at least one sofa sized futon.
We arrived in Florence by train and this apartment was a really easy walk from the station. Just head for the Hotel Baglioni and keep going down Via Del Melarancio. The next Piazza will contain a building housing Trattoria Lo Stracotto. The apartment is above the restaurant. For those concerned with accessibility, there is a step up at the entrance to the building and one step up between the entrance and the lift.
There is a Conad City grocery store a block away down Via Del Melarancio. Also, the apartment is located only a couple blocks from the Mercato di San Lorenzo. If cooking isn’t your thing, the upper floor of Mercato di San Lorenzo contains a quite large food court area.
The major sites visited in Florence were the Cathedral of Santa Maria Dei Fiore (the Duomo), Pitti Palace, Basilica of San Croce, and the Accademia (David). The only escorted tour within Florence was to the Accademia because we wanted the expert commentary of a guide for my mother’s benefit. This was my wife’s and I’s second visit to the Accademia and I must say that our first tour guide (2 years ago) was much better. Otherwise, in Florence, we were on our own. We spent all day at the Pitti Palace which worked out well because it rained most of the day.
While in Florence, we did take an escorted tour of the Chianti region. This tour was probably the highlight of our trip. It was really fabulous. It was a small-ish (20 person) tour and the tour guide was excellent. We headed south out of Florence and first stop was after about 90 minutes when we stopped at Principe Corsini for a tour of the wine and olive oil operations and a wine tasting. This was a very class act with expert commentary about both industries (wine and olive oil) and the tasting consisted of three wines accompanied by three cheeses. The next stop was lunch at La Cantinette in Regnana outside Greve. The food and wine was fabulous – well above expectations. We made an extended stop in Greve in Chianti to walk off lunch before making our last wine-tasting stop at Osteria 1126 in Cinciano. Once again, this was a fabulous wine tasting accompanied by 3 different varieties of cured meats paired with the wine. This tour was operated by Walk About Florence as the Chianti Wine and Food Safari.
We also took the train up to Pisa and Lucca while in Florence. The last trip to Florence, the wife and I didn’t make it up to Pisa. To be quite honest, we really didn’t miss much – Pisa is pretty much all about the leaning tower and that’s about it. My biggest take-away from Pisa is a new-found hatred for selfie-sticks.
Lucca, on the other hand, is a wonderful and enchanting place. We loved it. It was wonderful to walk the wall and wonder the backstreets of this quaint city. This is definitely a city we’ll come back to.