I knew that before I left Italy, I needed to make a trip to Pisa. A short train ride from Florence, Pisa offers the perfect location to spend a quiet afternoon, acting like a complete tourist. You can also rent a car from Florence and drive about an hour. You’ll spend most of the time driving up the highway, but be careful once you get into Pisa because there are SO MANY roundabouts. Just go slow and ignore the crazy Italian drivers. People don’t really follow traffic laws in Italy so just keep your eyes open.
Trains run from Florence throughout the day to Pisa and the train station isn’t far from the main Piazza. We rented a car because Marissa and Jack wanted to have an Italian road trip (short as it was), before they left Italy. It ended up being a really fun time, complete with obligatory touristy shots with the tower. I think my favorite part of the entire day was watching everyone trying to “hold up” the tower. We all did it too, but it was just hilarious to sit down and watch everyone from a different angle than the photo was being taken at.
I actually thought that the tower would be bigger. It was still really cool to get to see it. Unfortunately for us it was high tourist season, so we didn’t get to go inside the church or up the tower since our time was limited. If you’re interested in visiting all of Pisa’s sites, you should get there early in the morning.
