Five days of Renaissance mornings, long Tuscan lunches, and evenings that end with a glass of something red.
Wheels up at lunchtime, gelato on the Ponte Vecchio by midnight.
Lands around 16:10 local time.
PisaMover shuttle to Pisa Centrale (8 min, ~€6), then the regional train to Firenze S.M.N. (~1 hr). The hotel is a five-minute walk from the platform.
Hotel Adler Cavalieri, Via della Scala 40. Drop bags, change, back out.
Piazza dei Nerli 1, across the river in the Oltrarno — sourdough pizza and natural wine, properly unfussy. Leave the hotel by 19:10; it's a 15-minute walk over the Ponte alla Carraia.
Walk back over the Ponte alla Carraia and stop at Gelateria La Carraia — it's on the corner as you cross, which is convenient to the point of suspicious.
Ten minutes on from the gelato. You lose golden hour to dinner, but the cathedral floodlit and near-empty at eleven at night is arguably the better first look. Ponte Vecchio on the way home.
A palace, a perfumery, and a dinner that walks you across the river.
Not a picture gallery — a fortress and seat of government. The Salone dei Cinquecento is vast, and the tower gives you the Duomo from above. Combined ticket €22; book online, the walk-up queue can pass two hours in August. Tower last entry 16:30.
You walk straight out into it. Open-air sculpture under the loggia, free and permanently open. Then Orsanmichele and the Ponte Vecchio in daylight.
The famous schiacciata, eaten standing up. Keep it light — you have four hours of eating this evening. If the queue is silly, Procacci does truffle panini and a glass of prosecco instead.
The world's oldest pharmacy-perfumery, founded 1221 by Dominican friars — and it's on your own street. Free to wander, frescoed, and blissfully air-conditioned.
Four hours with Cooking Italy, 17:00–21:00. Meet at Torre dei Belfredelli, 2 Via dei Ramaglianti — Oltrarno, about 15 minutes on foot from the hotel. This is dinner — don't book a table as well.
Marble before the crowds, seven wines by sunset.
About 90 minutes is plenty. No cloakroom, so small bags only (max 40×30×18cm), airport-style security, no food or drink inside.
Five minutes away and right beside the market. Michelangelo's New Sacristy — sculpture rather than paintings, and startlingly empty compared to everywhere else. Forty-five minutes does it.
Browse the market floor downstairs, early lunch in the food hall above. Leave by 13:40 to make the tram.
T1.3 towards Villa Costanza from Alamanni · Stazione, about 20 minutes, €1.70 from the machine. The meeting point is not in the centre — this is the bit that catches people out.
Two wineries, seven wines, paired with cheese, olive oil, salami and bruschetta. Be there by 14:30 — look for the green myTour board outside The Florence Gate Caffetteria. Back around 20:45.
View on Art for the Duomo lit up, or Locale Firenze for cocktails in a Renaissance palazzo.
The hardest morning and the easiest afternoon of the whole trip.
463 steps, no lift, single-file and narrow near the top. Arrive 15 minutes early, small bags only (free locker ~100m away), knees and shoulders covered.
Michelangelo's and Galileo's tombs, then the Scuola del Cuoio behind the church. Your dome ticket also covers the Baptistery mosaics and Giotto's bell tower for three days.
Ten minutes east and a world away from the tourist centre — a proper neighbourhood food market with cheap trattorie inside. Keep it light; you're being massaged at two. Gelato at Vivoli on the way back.
Massage for two plus the private circuit — sauna, Turkish bath, counter-current jacuzzi. Exactly where you want to be at two in the afternoon in August.
Wander over early and take a spritz in the piazza — it's the most relaxed square in the city at that hour, and it's on the way to dinner.
Via del Leone 50/R in San Frediano — lively, family-run, and worth the tortelli. Five minutes on from the piazza.
Walk home along the river. No plan required.
Bags behind the desk, the best view in Florence, one last long lunch.
The view you came for — the whole city, the dome and the Arno from above. Go early: it's cool, empty and the light is behind you. Roughly 35 minutes on foot via the Poggi steps, or take bus 12 or 13 up and walk down.
Two hundred metres further uphill and almost nobody bothers. An eleventh-century basilica with an inlaid marble floor and a view even better than the Piazzale. Free, opens 09:30.
Walk back down through Porta San Miniato and into the artisan lanes of Santo Spirito and San Frediano — leather, gilding, marbled paper, and no queues anywhere.
Osteria Santo Spirito under the trees, then a final gelato at Gelateria della Passera.
Bags come back from reception. No later than 17:40 — airport by around 19:00.
Home by midnight, tanned and slightly heavier.
Five days, one perfect city — and a partner who can never again claim you're unorganised.