Basically anything north of the Arno river is likely to be in the ZTL unless you're way north of the center. A lot of people rent their cards on the way OUT of Florence and maybe only return to drop off the car. You generally don't want to cross south of the Arno and then cross back because you're entering the ZTL, which are cameras which record your license plate and send you a bill each time you cross into the ZTL zone.

So no you do not want to have a car in Florence unless you're outside of the center, meaning well south of the river or well north of the center of town. You can Google for Florence ZTL and probably find some maps.

I don't know about cars in Camogli or what the parking is like there. Thees are small towns so if very visitor had cars there wouldn't be enough parking. When you search for hotels, you could filter for parking. Even hotels which offer parking will may charge you each night.

You could certainly drive to Lucca, though be prepared to hike a bit from the parking. That would have been the case in Bologna too.

I think often agriturismos are recommended because there would usually be parking, maybe even a pool. But you're outside of the towns so if you want to go to a restaurant, you have to drive in, pay to park, maybe hike a bit. Or maybe there are agriturismo's which will offer you half board, dinner on the premises.

I once stayed in a place outside of Arezzo. Nice distant views of the city below but you had to go up narrow dirt roads. Made me anxious to get through that uphill road and then get out of there because it was a chore to drive it. And there was no rain so I'd hate to deal with the mud. Well this place served dinner but one of the featured dishes was pigeon, which I wanted no part of -- I don't need the cuisine to be that authentic.

scrb11 Thank you for all of this! Sounds like I may need to do some rethinking.. So what you are saying is that a car really only makes sense if you are staying in a countryside accommodation with parking? I love the idea of going on drives in the countryside but we do prefer to stay in town for most of our time.

I haven't tried to stay in Florence with a car. But the times I've rented a car, it was only leaving and then returning to drop off the car.

It's a hassle to try to avoid the ZTL cameras and I can imagine doing that for several days would be aggravating. Also parking probably isn't easy or cheap.

So I never tried to have a car while staying in Florence. Many things to do there and if you want to take some short day trips to Pisa or Siena, there are buses and trains.

But if you wanted to go to smaller hill towns like Volterra for further south like Pienza, Montalcino, Montepulciano, then having a car makes more sense. I stayed in Pienza in 2019 at a hotel which was just outside the gates of the centro storico there and it was great because I could drive to nearby towns and then in the evenings, it was a short walk to grab dinner.

"So no you do not want to have a car in Florence unless you're outside of the center, meaning well south of the river or well north of the center of town. You can Google for Florence ZTL and probably find some maps."

Agree about avoiding the car in Florence. We also rent a car on the way out of town if we are planning to visit small towns in the area.