Month: January 2016

Spend The Day In Overlooked Lucca

Horse and carriage with young girl in Piazza del Giglio Lucca, Italy
Horse and carriage with young girl in Piazza del Giglio, Lucca, Italy

How interesting to be a young girl with your father discussing the prospect of a ride in a carriage.

The setting in the photo above is the Piazza del Giglio, just a short walk inside the city walls of Lucca.

Lucca is rather run down in a ‘faded beauty’ kind of way. It has Squares and narrow streets and a massive city wall twenty or so feet high, built in brick that encircles the town.

The wall is breached by footpaths, and that is the route we took walking into town from the station. It was a special feeling walking through the tunnel in the wall – like entering a besieged town.

Go to Lucca

“Yes, Lucca is nice to visit.”

You know how one has to listen to the choice of words and the intonation when someone local recommends a place to visit.

We often have discussions about exactly what we did hear with these recommendations. Did we both hear the moment of someone holding back when we asked about visiting such and such a place?

Did we both hear an intonation that reveals that while Lucca is nice, it is not that nice?

And then there are all the other competing places to visit on a day trip from Florence. Are some of these better choices?

The town is nice and homely. People are friendly. We stood in the early evening looking at the fair in the Piazza Napoleone, drinking in the atmosphere and the pace of life.

Go there if you get the chance.