Daytrip: Florence to Pisa and Lucca
 

Hi
Has anyone gone to both in one day from Florence? I believe that the train from Florence goes to the Pisa Centrale station, and that is walkable to the Piazza in Pisa.
If after an hour or two I wanted to go to Lucca, and from there back to Florence, do I have to use different train stations?
Is the Lucca train station centrally located vis a vis sightseeing?
etc etc
thanks

Hi Elaine....I understand the train station in Lucca is just outside the city wall and has several stops each day. Pls be sure it travels onto Florence, however, as the trains are notorious for strikes, last minute changes, etc... Check out the various trains schedules on the internet to get a better fix on your question.
Bob

I've done this in one day and suggest you go to Lucca first and then Pisa. Lucca pretty much shuts down in the afternoon. I would spend the morning touring Lucca, have lunch, then catch the train to Pisa.

You can catch a bus to Lucca across the street from the Florence train station. We took the bus because it was the heat wave of 2003 and the bus had AC. The train was a regional train without AC.

The travel time between Florence and Lucca are about the same whether you take the bus or train.

From Lucca we caught an R train to the S. Rossore station which is closer to the tower. I think the ride was about 20 minutes. When you get off the train, you cross the tracks and go through the fence.

After seeing the tower, we caught a bus to Pisa Centrale to get the train back to Florence.

There is an Il Papiro across the street from the tower which had better prices than the one in Florence. They sell handmade papers and cards.

There are busses that run between the tower and Pisa Centrale for about 1E.

The Lucca station is an easy walk to the old town.

Thanks for this thread elaine, and thanks to kybourban for the advice. We were planning to leave Florence to go to Rapallo for a 6 night stay, and only go thru Pisa on the way. We will add Lucca to our plans that day. Phil

Pisa in general seemed perfectly safe to me, but San Rossore station and environs were not safe at all. We saw an elderly American man near the station who had been violently mugged and was bleeding and had been robbed. There were syringes and other addict detritus in the underpass near the station. I would not use that station. I still find the memory of the entire experience, even the part before we saw the injured man, just walking through the trash left by addicts, creepy.

Phil - I'm not sure there will be luggage storage at the train station in Lucca.

Sorry to jump into your thread this way elaine, but I get so excited about planning our 3 weeks in southern Switzerland and northern Italy. Kybourban- I will look into the baggage problem--even though we should have only a 20 lb. bag each, we don't want to take them sightseeing. Thanks, Phil

Hi
a friend of mine just got back from Italy and spent an an afternoon in Lucca. She didn't feel that the town had shut down.
Knowing that I will spend only a couple of hours in Pisa, I think I'd prefer to go there in the morning and go on to Lucca in the pm. If I love Lucca, I can then stay as long as I like, even into the evening. Days aren't terribly long in early April, I'd rather run out of daylight in Lucca then in Pisa.

So, if I go from F to Pisa first, how would the logistics of train vs bus, and the different train stations, be accounted for?

Thank you all so far.

ttt

one more try

Elaine - If you are going to Pisa first, take the train from Florence to Pisa Centrale. There will be many to choose from, ES, IC, R. From Pisa Centrale there is the shuttle bus to the tower. After touring the tower take the shuttle bus(catch it beside the tower) back to Centrale to catch the train to Lucca. This will probably be an R or D train. I don't think the Pisa S. Rossore station is manned all of the time so I don't think you could purchase a ticket there.
Of course you can look at the schedules on trenitalia.com

thanks, I was getting confused about whether the train from Pisa to Lucca runs from Pisa Centrale or Pisa San Rossore. Or is it both? And then I guess it's the bus back from Lucca to Florence?

I don't remember how many busses there were daily between Lucca and Florence but I doubt if they run late. I think you will need to train back from Lucca to Florence.

one last topping of my own

Just to add more confusion - we went to Pisa in the morning from Florence, then on to Lucca in the afternoon, and back to Florence a few weeks ago all on trains. We purchased all three tickets in Florence. The first is Firenze to Pisa Centrale, the second Pisa S. Rossore to Lucca. I asked the ticket agent about it and she said that they both are the same. In reality, we got off and on again at Pisa Centrale where there is a bus to the tower area. Catch the #1 bus across the street from the station for the shortest ride.
We did this on a Sunday and really enjoyed the walk around the wall at Lucca late in the afternoon when many local families were strolling.
On Sunday in Pisa the only tobacco shop that seemed to be open for bus tickets was in the train station.
It's a nice day trip.

thanks judybr

Bear with me, I'm not clear.
After your visit to the tower in Pisa, you went back to the Centrale station to go on to Lucca? Or, in Pisa you boarded at the SR station for the train to Lucca?

Pisa Centrale and S. Rossore are not the same station. If judybr boarded the train at Centrale with a ticket that was for S. Rossore/Lucca then she was riding without a valid ticket and could have been fined. The fines are the price of the ticket + 25 Euro if caught. The stations are a 7 minute train ride apart.

ok, I went to trenitalia and am posting this information here for future searches.

The trains from Firenze (Florence) to Pisa go to Pisa Centrale station (abbreviated as Pisa C.)
The train route from Pisa to Lucca has trains leaving Pisa from either Pisa Central or Pisa S. Rossore stations.
I don't know if each train goes through both stations or not, but there are departures listed from both Pisa stations.

So, if you've seen the Leaning Tower and want to go back to Florence, you walk back to Centrale station in Pisa.
If you want to go on to Lucca, you can check departures from either of the two Pisa station, but the S. R. station is closer to the Leaning Tower.

I didn't mean to say walk back to Centrale, you could take a bus.

If you enter Pisa Centrale/Lucca on Trenitalia it will show about four trains at a time. Click on the number to the far left (1,2,3,4) and when the next screen appears, click on the train number. A box will appear showing all the stops that trains makes and at what time.

thanks
I linked this thread to Helpful Information on Italy 2

From Pisa we did go to the Pisa Centrale train station to catch the train to Lucca. Our ticket did say Pisa S. Rossore to Lucca. I had no idea we were not using valid tickets since the ticket agent in Florence had said they were the same. We assumed it didn't matter. I'm usually so neurotic about everything being just so, but for some reason didn't think anything of it!

Judy, Maybe the Florence ticket agent was right?
I was curious and checked the fares, it's 2.2e from both Pisa stations to Lucca, so *perhaps* the ticket is valid from either station? Regards, Walter

Hi Elaine,

we did it last september. First Pisa early in the morning, and then we went to Lucca.

At the beginning I was confused between Pisa Centrale and Pisa San Rossore, and the trains to Lucca, but we ended up going back to Pisa Centrale for our train to Lucca.

It was quite easy, and we found quite a few people doing the same thing as us. We walked from the station in Pisa (I had printed a map beforehand, but we stopped at the tourist office to pick up a map) to the Tower, took a few pictures and decided that there was way too many people around ;) We walked back to the station, got our tickets to Lucca and arrived there on time to have lunch. I didn´t feel that Lucca was empty in the afternoon, and in fact we ended up liking it a lot. Don´t miss San Frediano, great mosaics.

One thing that helped me a lot was to do a search of the timetables between Florence, Pisa and Lucca at the Deutsche Bahn website, and carried them with me. We knew more or less when we had a train, and it was quite handy.

Kind regards,
Cova

more great details, thanks all

"Has anyone gone to both in one day from Florence?"

Yes, but Lucca is not worth the bother.

Another undetailed cranky complaint from this same source. Hornet indeed.

Just back from Tuscany. Lucca is a lovely town but the shops do close from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm so if shopping is on your agenda a morning visit will be better.

Walter - I wouldn't make that assumption about the tickets. If you enter Pisa Centrale and Rossore as destinations on Trenitalia there is a fare of 1.1E to ride from one to the other. I would ask at the train station.

It's like saying the price from Rome Tiburtina to Florence is 22E and Rome Termini to Florence is 22E therefore you don't have to pay to ride between the two or have a proper ticket?

"Another undetailed cranky complaint from this same source. Hornet indeed."

Lucca has nothing. How much more detailed can you get? Stupid person attacks like your are what is really cranky.

Opinions from people who love everything are worthless. The only people worth listening to are those willing to say say that some stuff sucked.