When you visit Florence, Italy, you might end up feeling like you’ve entered the Renaissance era. Artwork (and sandwiches) will dominate your visit.

How long to stay?

For us, the city of Florence was just a brief stop for us along our one-month journey around the world. As a result, we were only here a total of two nights–and half a day was spent on a daytrip to nearby Pisa. In retrospect, I probably would have added on a day with that planned daytrip as it made our stay in Florence pretty short.

More than other cities in Italy, Florence felt more like a place to both check out the artwork and also sit back and people watch. While we were there, we saw many others just sitting on the steps and have a great time letting the day pass. So there is a bit more of a chill vibe here compared to the other Italian cities and there were far fewer people roaming the streets trying to sell us useless junk.

What we did in Florence

CitySightseeing Firenze

I used to be a big fan of those hop-on-hop-off sightseeing buses but I’ve since come to realize they’re only good at limited locations. That’s because many cities have ample public transportation to take you around town. So you could “cheat” and look at their map on their website and recreate it yourself.

So where do these sightseeing tours come in handy? When there isn’t easy public transportation available and the sites are spread out. In Florence, we found it helpful to use this HOHO bus to take us around town. The narrated voice offered some information on the area, but personally I’d rather listen to a Rick Steves recording if it’s not live narration.

Galleria degli Uffizi

Florence is a great city to come admire the artwork of famous Italians. You’ll find many of these works of art at the Galleria degli Uffizi. Book your tickets in advance to ensure you get in. While I only have pictures of the art of Botticelli below, you’ll also find works from other artists like Michelangelo and Leonardo. (I didn’t find the other Ninja Turtles here.)

It’s worth a couple hours of your day to stop by and walk around. I think you’ll be as amazed as we were with what’s on display here.

Galleria dell’Accademia

Let’s get it out of the way first. The main reason why everyone comes here–and why the crowds are so huge–is because this is where you’ll find Michelangelo’s David. It’s a masterful work of art that looks all the more impressive when you see it in person. What pictures and media fail to accurately capture is just how massive the sculpture is. It’s worth the wait to come in (there are crowds even if you already have a reservation).

There are other works of art to see here beyond David, so it’s not just a one-trick pony.

Day trip to Pisa

We mentioned it briefly in our post on Pisa, but Florence serves as an excellent base for exploring the city. Some people decide to visit Pisa on the way to other cities, but we didn’t want to deal with storing our luggage at the airport while we checked out the city. Depending on the schedule, the train trip could be as short as 1 hour in length.

While you’re there, you’ll want to check out their most famous attraction (the leaning tower) but there are some other museums to check out as well. The city is on the smaller side, so keeping this as a day trip probably is enough for most. Unless, that is, you’re planning on touring more of the countryside.

Where we ate in Florence

Some of the places no longer exist from when we went before, so we’ll only emphasize the more memorable meals we had that still exist.

All’Antico Vinaio

This is one of the best sandwiches we’ve ever eaten. It was so good, in fact, that we ate here twice during our short visit. That combination of freshly sliced meat and vegetables, the quality of the bread used, and maybe just some Italian charm is all we need. We had plans to dine elsewhere but scrapped it in favor of eating another sandwich.

The best part? They’re actually very affordable (at the time only €5 but now still just €8-€12). It feels like this is what everyone eats in Florence given what you see everyone doing in the city. I’ve even had casual conversations with others on unrelated topics and they’ve brought up the sandwiches. So give it a shot (or two) and you won’t be disappointed.

Where we stayed in Florence

Hotel De La Ville

Back when I was contemplating a stay in Florence, I was a little stuck. I didn’t have many Marriott points (and no status) and so that ruled out options like the St. Regis Florence or the Westin Excelsior. Instead, I relied more on finding a stay close to where we needed to be and that wasn’t too expensive since we weren’t looking to be in the room all that often. That led us to the Hotel De La Ville, a charming hotel that used real keys to lock your door.

We talked briefly about the property before, but we truly did like how close it was to the city center. That’s probably one of the main selling features of the property, to be honest. The room itself was very Italian. And by that I mean pretty much every hotel in Italy we’ve stayed at has a very local feel to it. Rooms are cozy and while you’ll get good sleep, the point isn’t to spend a lot of time in your room. The emphasis is more on soaking in everyday life in Italy.

The hotel also does have an extensive breakfast buffet as part of our room rate. Outside of a true luxury hotel, this was one of the more impressive included spreads we’ve seen. If you’re tired of chain hotels or want to try something a little different, the Hotel De La Ville is a pretty good option to consider.

For more images, refer to our dedicated post on this hotel.

What do you love about Florence, Italy?

Suggested reading:

• Other destinations we’ve visited
• Train: Florence, Italy to Milan, Italy
• Secret Trip Destination #2 – Florence, Italy