One Perfect Week in Tuscany: The LussoIQ Itinerary

Most people do Tuscany wrong. They spend three days in Florence, take a day trip to Siena, and drive through Chianti on the way to the airport. They see the architecture. They eat the pasta. They buy the wine at the airport. They go home with photographs and a vague feeling that something was just out of reach.

This itinerary is for the other kind of traveller. The one who wants to understand Tuscany rather than photograph it. Seven days, unhurried, moving through the region the way it was designed to be moved through — slowly, with meals that take two hours and roads that take three times longer than the map suggests.

Day 1 & 2 — Florence & Fiesole

Arrive into Florence and resist the urge to immediately queue for the Uffizi. Check into Hotel Lungarno on the Oltrarno side of the river — the correct side — and spend the first afternoon doing nothing more ambitious than sitting on the terrace with a Spritz and watching the Arno slip under the Ponte Vecchio.

On day two, see one museum. Just one. The Uffizi if you must, the Accademia if David is your priority, the Bargello if you want to see the greatest collection of Renaissance sculpture with almost nobody else present. Spend the afternoon in Oltrarno — the artisan workshops, the Santo Spirito piazza, the early Michelangelo crucifix in the basilica that most visitors never find. Take the bus up to Fiesole in the late afternoon and watch Florence go golden from the hill the Etruscans settled before Rome existed.

In the evening, walk across the Ponte Vecchio and eat at one of the trattorias on Via dei Serragli. Order whatever they tell you to order.

Where to stay: Hotel Lungarno, Oltrarno. Book Here.

Experience: Hot Air Balloon Ride above Florence — Florence from 3,000 feet, prosecco on landing. Book Here.

Day 3 & 4 — Chianti

Drive south on the SR222 — the Chiantigiana — and do not hurry. The road was built for oxcarts and it still makes no apologies. Stop in Greve, in Panzano, in Radda. Buy wine directly from producers who will receive you like family if you call ahead. Eat lunch at a place with no English menu and no particular interest in being discovered.

Stay two nights in Chianti — at Borgo San Felice or Pieve Aldina — and use the second day for a proper wine education. The Private Chianti Backroads Wine Safari takes you off the main road in a 4WD, into cellars that have been producing Sangiovese for six centuries, and to a lunch table with views that justify the entire trip.

Where to stay: Borgo San Felice (Book Here) or Pieve Aldina, Chianti. Book Here.

Experience: Private Chianti Backroads Wine Safari. Book Here.

Day 5 — Val d'Orcia

Leave Chianti after breakfast and drive south into something stranger and more beautiful. The Val d'Orcia begins where the vineyards end and the pale clay hills take over — UNESCO protected, achingly photogenic, and more alive than any photograph has ever managed to suggest.

Stop in Pienza for Pecorino and a coffee in the piazza. Drive the white gravel strade bianche between the farmhouses. Arrive at Adler Spa Resort Thermae or Rosewood Castiglion del Bosco in the late afternoon and do not leave until morning.

In the evening, book the Val d'Orcia Brunello Wine Tour for the following day — Montalcino, Montepulciano, a lunch table with the UNESCO landscape below it.

Where to stay: Adler Spa Resort Thermae (Book Here) or Rosewood Castiglion del Bosco, Val d'Orcia. Book Here.

Experience: Val d'Orcia Brunello Wine Tour. Book Here.

Day 6 — Siena & the Crete Senesi

Drive north through the Crete Senesi in the morning — the pale lunar hills that roll south of Siena deserve at least an hour of your attention and a stop at the Abbey of Monte Oliveto Maggiore, which appears without warning on a hillside and rewards the detour completely.

Arrive in Siena by noon. The Piazza del Campo is the most beautiful public square in Italy and it will take approximately four minutes to understand why. Eat lunch in the campo. Visit the cathedral in the afternoon — it is overwhelming and correct. In the evening, if Alessandro is available, book the truffle hunt in the Crete Senesi woods and end the day in his shop in central Siena with wine and the morning's findings on a board in front of you.

Where to stay: Grand Hotel Continental Siena (Book Here) or Certosa di Maggiano. Book Here.

Experience: Truffle Hunting in the Crete Senesi with Alessandro and Moka. Book Here.

Day 7 — Lucca

Drive northwest through the Chianti hills one last time. Arrive in Lucca by mid-morning, hire a bicycle at the walls, and ride the full circuit — four kilometres, tree-lined, with the medieval city spread below you on one side and the Apuan Alps on the other. Lock the bike. Walk into the Roman amphitheatre piazza for lunch. Visit the Guinigi Tower. Ask to see the Roman ruins beneath Palazzo Dipinto if you are staying there. Eat dinner at the same restaurant you had lunch at, because the first time was that good.

The Garfagnana — the valley north of Lucca between the marble mountains and the chestnut forests — deserves its own trip. Note it for next time.

Where to stay: Grand Universe Lucca (Book Here) or Palazzo Dipinto, Lucca. Book Here.

Closing:

Seven days in Tuscany done properly leaves you with the particular dissatisfaction of a place only half understood. That is not a failure. That is Tuscany working exactly as intended. Book the same itinerary for next year and start from where you left off.

Marco Silvano is the editorial director of LussoIQ.