Florence & Bologna trip - recommendations please

[roamingcat]

Hello,

Were going to Florence & Bologna for a minimoon after our wedding and are looking for recommendations on places to stay and things to do. We were thinking of doing a few days trips to places like Lucca or Sienna so if you have any specific recommendations please share them!

What time of year are you going?
We went for a mini break in October and Florence was absolutely heaving with tourists, apparently it's all year round. I had been several times pre pandemic and it was no whereas busy. Make sure you book the visit to the Duomo rooftop in advance.

Just back from this trip with my son. We went very off season and it was brilliant. I've written up a long blog post about it with loads of tips.

affordacool.wordpress.com/2025/01/01/florence-and-bologna/

I should add I've been to both Lucca and Siena before as well and both are fabulous

We stayed at Maginolle Relais and Charm which is just outside Florence bit a cheap taxi ride away. It was lovely hearing a lively cockerel but then being so close. The owner organised paid trips himself eg to vineyards or Pisa. Luca is easy to get to by train and is lovely.You can walk the city walls. There are numerous excursions to Sienna if yoy don’t hire a car and usually you also go to San Gimnano . Florence is lovely but it’s better to do the tourist thing late afternoon when the excursions and cruise boats leave. Check to see if the Ufizzi still does late opening, Many of the palaces do. There is so much to see in Florence alone.

For Florence book any of the main sites - Uffizi, Accademia, Palazzo
Vecchio, Duomo - in advance and you can get combination tickets for these and other sites. The Vesari corridor is reopening on a restricted basis and the Michelangelo cell below the Medici chapel. Bologna is lovely, go inside the library and see the archaeology below. There are free walking tours from the tourist office. Lucca you can walk around the walls, Siena sit and people watch in the main square. Volterra is interesting if you can hire a car to get there. Vinci is worth a visit if you interested in the background to Leonardo da Vinci, There are various thermal spa towns if you fancy time off sightseeing.

I've recently visited Bologna last year and really enjoyed. Food fabulous. Recommend a visit to the mosaics in Ravenna.
Luca is also a very picturesque city.

Were going in March so hoping it'll be less busy than peak summer!

Thank you for this. Heading to Florence in June and you posted some fantastic advice.

Florence - Christmas- perfect. Lively but not heaving. Like UK early spring and the indoor market was ace; glass of wine and people watch. Going again this year.

A second recommendation for Ravenna. It's amazing and about an hour on the train from Bologna. The mosaics are spectacular.

@LondonMummer, your blog is great, super helpful! We will be in Bologna in June (most likely hot and heaving but we do have a timeframe we need to work to). We'll be sure to check out some of your recommendations.

DD and I had five days in Florence end of September/early October, we were surprised at how busy it was but had a great time. We did a day trip to Siena which was great - easy and cheap to just get the local train rather than an organised tour - and a pasta and gelato making class in the hills which was fun. We loved the Mercato Centrale for aperol spritzes and porchetta sandwiches.

We are just back from 6 days in Bologna. We loved it. The food and the city itself. We did day trips to Padua and Florence by train. Loved Padua as I have always wanted to see the Scrovegni Chapel. Florence we went to because last time we went we didn't book the Uffizi and I wanted to go. It was summer and I found it hot and far too busy. On that visit we also visited Luca and Siena and much preferred them. We also said this time that Florence was our least liked city. No idea why but having visited in summer and in winter I disliked it both times.

We did 4 days (Saturday to Tuesday) in Florence in October half-term, flew into Pisa Friday night and so arrived by train into Florence Saturday morning, it was busy but I've seen worse. The most heaving location was Pizza Michaelangelo for sunset, and it wasn't even a great sunset. Some of the museums shut on certain days, so Uffizi and Academia are both shut Monday. Tickets for the climb to the roof of the Duomo was the first thing to sell out, book ideally at least 3 weeks in advance, the ticket is called Brunelleschi pass and has access to the maximum number of things at the cathedral, there are 2 other tickets types that sells out more slowly. The baptistery at the cathedral is not worth queuing for at the moment, they are doing renovations on the mosaic ceiling and you can't see anything. In terms of speed of tickets running out this was followed by the Academia and then Uffizi. Preferred the Academia to the Uffizi personally. I booked tickets to Cappella Brancacci, saw it recommended as one of the top sites somewhere but didn't rate it really when we arrived. I had combined tickets for Uffizi and Palazzo Pitti, then pre-booked a separate free ticket for a slot on a 30 minute tour of the apartments at Palazzo Pitti, which was my favourite part of that building. In October the cafe and the ice-cream kiosk marked on the map were both closed in the Boboli gardens, no food or drink options to be found anywhere. We didn't do any day trips, in fact with 3.5 days we missed at least 3 or 4 things like the Bargello museum that I would have liked to see in Florence, but I knew that was likely before we set-off.

We stayed in an Airbnb apartment next to the Duomo in Florence , a 15 minute walk to the train station.
Long day trips to Lucca, Siena, San Gimignano, Pisa and Bologna were easy and brilliant.

This is brilliant @LondonMummer Have you done any other travel blogs you could share please?

Ah thanks. Yes I have. My husband is Dutch so I have a very extensive blog about Amsterdam (and The Netherlands)

https://amsterdamwonderland.com/

And then a general blog with other trips including a number of destinations in Italy as well as Vienna, Japan New York, Barcelona and more. You can find it here

https://affordacool.wordpress.com/

its really just a passion project so no advertising etc

Thank you so much. That’s fantastic x