Lay of the Land
Like all of Italy, the Tuscany region experienced various takeovers and wars throughout its history and for a great length of time was under control of the Roman Empire. It came into its own beginning in the 1400s when the arts and culture began to flourish in the city of Florence, in particular. Tuscany is the birthplace of the poet Dante and the artists Michelangelo, da Vinci, and Botticelli. While these names are today sprinkled prominently throughout art history books, Renaissance artists in general were at first considered low-grade craftsmen. It was not until the end of the Renaissance that their works began to command higher prices, as the value of art and culture rose both within Tuscany and beyond. It's that same appreciation for all things beautiful that draw millions of tourists to Tuscany each year. Between April and October, visitors outnumber the 360,000 or so residents of Florence.
Fact
Tuscany is so renowned for its cultural beauty that it shows up in American pop culture with some regularity. The 2003 film Under the Tuscan Sun starring Diane Lane was a $43 million domestic blockbuster, and during the seventh season of Seinfeld, the character Maestro bragged that Jerry could never find a villa in Tuscany.
Getting Here
There are two main airports in the Tuscany region: Galileo Galilei International Airport in Pisa, and Peretola Airport outside Florence.
Galileo Galilei, which sees nearly 4 million passengers each year, offers service from the United States through Delta Air Lines as well as connecting international flights on Air France, British Airways, and Lufthansa. There are also connecting buses and trains to Pisa's main station, as well as to the Santa Maria Novella station in Florence. You can find flight schedules, train schedules, airport maps and more in English at
Peretola Airport is much smaller — it has only a single runway — and offers no international service from the United States, but you can pick up regional flights from Rome. There is no connecting train service, but buses run into the city of Florence every half hour most of the day. The airport's website is
Getting Around
Once in Tuscany, you can take buses or trains from one city to the next. It's about an hour's train ride, for instance, from Florence inland to Pisa on the coast. Train and bus service becomes spottier when you head into the countryside, but if your plan is to stick to Tuscany's cities, you will not need a rental car. You can book single-ride tickets or multiple-day train passes through
Question
Why isn't Peretola Airport named after someone famous, as other Italian airports are?
It actually is. Though the facility's official name is Peretola Airport, it's sometimes referred to as Amerigo Vespucci Airport, in honor of the Italian explorer who proved that Christopher Columbus had not sailed to Asia, but instead to a previously unknown continent.
Once you are in the city of your choice, you will be able to get around to the main cathedrals, monuments, and other tourist attractions on foot. That's one of the greatest things about visiting such storied locations: They were mostly laid out before “urban sprawl” became so much as a thought in any residential planner's mind.
