we're a little concerned about cars -trains and buses. we prefer not to have a car in florence when we arrive and stay for 3 days..but do want one in siena to do the hill towns.
here's our itinerary so far
florence 3 nites
sienna 3-4 nites
lucca and pisa 3 nites
depart florence sept 17
so the questions are
can we train or bus to sienna from florence /train or bus to lucca from sienna/train or bus back to florence airport
and rent a car in sienna?
can anyone make suggestions about these plans?
thanks

I suggest that you get a 7-day rental (less expensive per day that way) when you leave Florence. No trains or buses. You can't drive into Siena (or Lucca) so find a place just outside and from there you can visit the hill towns etc...

Hi J,

>here's our itinerary so far
florence 3 nites
sienna 3-4 nites
lucca and pisa 3 nites
depart florence sept 17
so the questions are
can we train or bus to sienna from florence

Take the SITA bus - Via Santa Caterina de Siena, near the SMN train station.
SITA bus schedules are at http://tinyurl.com/ybe6xk

>train or bus to lucca from sienna

You will have to go back to Florence and take the train from Florence SMN.

>train or bus back to florence airport
You have to go back to SMN and take a cab (about 15E) or a bus (about 10E for 2).

>rent a car in sienna?

Of course.

Have you considered flying into Florence FLR and out of Pisa PSA? You could see Florence, bus to Siena and rent car, drive to Lucca and drop car, take train to PSA to fly home.

See www.kayak.com for airfare.

See www.trenitalia.com for trains.

yes we did think about flying to Florence and leaving from Pisa but AA doesn't have connecting flts from Pisa so we're stuck leaving from Florence.
Can anyone tell us how close the hill towns are from Siena? should we do a tour of 2 or three and stay overnight in a couple and return to siena afterwards or are they close enough that we could do day trips and keep coming back to siena as a base. we both hate packing (altho we're not taking much) we're in our 60's so we like a little pampering.

Lucca, Siena and Florence are all close enough proximity to be easy day trips from any as a base.

well..lucca is 60 miles from the hill towns and siena is rite there..so we thought it was best to either rent a car in siena (stay there as home base) and then drive the car back to lucca since we leave from florence airport
we definately want to do lucca's week end antique market otherwise we wouldn't be so concerned about getting there.
the other thought was to stay in siena for a nite and drive to/sleep in some of the hill towns since everything i read says they're wonderful at nite when all the tourists go home..it's just that we worry about accommodations in the small towns
and frankly don't like the idea of booking ahead from the states.
also can anyone tell us how difficult it is to us a cell? we're going to get our cell ready for the trip but is it too expensive rick steves says to us a card
and thank you all for your help...this our first time in europe and it's very stressful not knowing ANYTHING..

We stayed in Volterra, Montalcino and Siena during our 3 day drive of Tuscan hill towns (1 night each) and Siena was the hardest to find reasonable accomodations in at the last minute. They're all great at night, though.