pdm

We plan on visiting Florence this Oct. and will be purchasing some gallery tickets online. For any gallery that allows visitors in at specific segments, like the Uffizi, would our online request have to coincide with the 20 minute admission time? Also, is there a best time of day to see the galleries? And, since there are so many people visiting the galleries, do they have a tendency to scoot you out at a certain time, other than closing? Thanks for your help!

cheryl

We ordered tickets online for our visit this past May. I requested 4:30 tickets and received them without any problem. Since the Uffizi is open quite late (at least in May it was open until 10 pm), we found it very convenient to make late afternoon reservations as it wasn't quite as crowded at that time of day. We made dinner reservations before we went to the Uffizi and then went straight to dinner afterwards. I have never heard of them chasing anyone out of the gallery, we did have to wait a few minutes to enter because there were too many people in the building. I think holding up entrances is their method of crowd control, but it was only a couple of minutes.

pdm

Thanks for your reply. Was your 4:30 time one of the 20 minutue time frames that the gallery lets people in or was it just the time you picked yourself to attend? Thanks

cheryl

I think 4:30 was just the time I picked, because I knew I wanted to have 4 hours at the museum and I planned on 9 pm dinner reservations. I wouldn't worry too much about it, just ask for the time you want, and my guess is that if it's a problem, your confirmation will just have a slightly different time by 10 minutes or so. <BR> <BR>By the way, I don't think you need to bother with reservations for the Accademia. We got about 15 minutes before it opened and just waited until opening. We also stayed not far from the Accademia, and whenever we walked by in the late afternoon, there was no line at all. I imagine that October will be much the same. Feel free to ask me any other questions you may have, I love Florence and am glad to help, if I can.

pdm

Thanks for your help. I will take your advice on both galleries. Any special and reasonably priced eating places? Do you know the average time restuarants stay open? I heard that Italians eat later than us USers. Like around 8 or so, any problem with finding a place to eat then? Appreciate it!!

cheryl

Italians do eat later than we are used to in the States. If you want to eat at a place that looks popular, either get there early, or make a reservation for the busier times. We usually found that before 8 or 8:30 we didn't need reservations. If we planned on eating after that, we made reservations. I don't know what time the restaurants close, I suspect you can probably still get served until 10 or 11 in most restaurants. We had an excellent meal at Osteria Santo Spirito on the Piazza Santo Spirito. Dinner for 2 with 2 courses and a bottle of house wine was about $60, I believe. The restaurant seemed to be very popular with locals as well as tourists. It also has tables outside, which you might enjoy on a nice night. We also had a wonderful meal at Cibreo, but that is more expensive, and we ate at Toscana one night. The food was quite good, but everyone was American, probably because Fodor's recommended it.