Hill Towns in Tuscany

Biking around the wall of Lucca one sunny day
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Hill Towns in Tuscany

September 20 – 28^th, 2006

Having the time to stop our journey to make our way up the very narrow, winding roads to these hill towns was what provided some of our best Tuscan experiences

Dreams sometimes do come true! A week in late September exploring hill towns in Tuscany is as close to any dream that I had for this trip! Having left Cinque Terre, it was only a short 3 hour drive to Lucca, a beautiful city with a walled old town dating back to Roman settlement 180 BC. We decided to make Lucca our Tuscan base and once again found a very comfortable suite, Le Ginestre (email: leginestre2002@yahoo.it), in the home of a wonderful family. It has certainly been our experience that living in an apartment not only gives us more space and the opportunity to make meals ‘at home’, but it also provides the priceless opportunity of meeting people who live, work and breathe the area in which we find ourselves. This, even more than the amazing and wonderful sights, is what we have come to love and enjoy about traveling. We left Lucca feeling like not only had we seen and experienced the city and environs, but we now have friends in Lucca!

Nozzano Castello at dusk (near Lucca)
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Back to hill towns; there are truly an amazing number of them in Tuscany and Umbria! We didn’t visit some of the famous ones such as San Gimignano and Siena, but we stumbled upon some very beautiful ones that we had never heard about before – Nozzano Castello, Volterra, Fabro and Orvieto. One is driving along, and suddenly there is a hill ahead of you and there on its tip is a hill town, often complete with walled medieval castle! Having the time to stop our journey to make our way up the very narrow, winding roads to these hill towns was what provided some of our best Tuscan experiences. More of these hill towns exist further south than we stayed, and in hindsight it may be better to stay further south than Lucca if you want to experience the ‘typical’ Tuscan countryside, but one does not have to travel far in any direction before coming upon a castle or hill town to explore. They are old, medieval and just like out of Romeo and Juliet, and the amazing thing is that there are still communities living inside the walls of these castles. One imagines that they are living in the same house that their forefathers of the 14^th century lived in! Now that is history!

Castle located at the crest of Volterre
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Of course, we did make a trip to Pisa too (only 20 minutes from Lucca by car). The tower does really lean and it is truly more impressive in person than in pictures.