In July 2023, after going to Berlin for 1 week, I decided it would be best to go to Pisa before going to Florence for the Doist retreat because flights were usually less expensive there.

A bit more than 2 days in the city and the experience was nice to relax and walk around the city.

Stay

I stayed at Hotel Roma (weird, isn’t it? 🤣). The place is very well located for tourists, literally 5 minutes walking from the main square with the leaning tower. The breakfast was good enough for my taste, you can have good enough coffee, bread, juice, water, etc. Some people think it’s poor, but to me it’s good enough.

That’s everything the place has to offer, unfortunately. It was very hot inside my room even with their air conditioning turned on. The air conditioner is ancient, so it may explain.

Being so close to the main square also means I will be far from everything else that is good and non-touristic. I just realized it when looking for good food.

My recommendation is to look somewhere else for your stay.

Airport

I arrived at the Pisa airport, coming from Berlin and everything was smooth.

My flight was at night, so I arried in Pisa around 22. I decided to go walking to the hotel, because transport doesn’t seem simple enough and it was not that far away.

Nothing bad happened, but I felt a bit insecure between the airport and a few blocks after the train station. For what I read, people said the blocks around the train station are the most dangerous parts of Pisa, so my “spider sense” was good.

If it was during the day, I would feel better, I think.

Transport

I walked everywhere while in the city. It’s not that big, especially if you’re only doing touristic stuff.

I got the train to leave Pisa and go to Florence, nothing to complain about it. The train station is not that clean, but it worked for my needs.

Places

If you’re planning to go to the top of the leaning tower, I recommend buying the full ticket, as the leaning tower is the most expensive and if you want to visit a second monument, it will be the price of the full ticket already.

  • Walking tour: I went to a walking tour via Guruwalk. Literally booked it 20 minutes before it started. The guide was a cool guy who lives in Florence, so he also gave people some tips if they wanted to go there. We went through the history of Pisa and visited places other than the leaning tower.
  • Piazza del Duomo: The main square, that contains the catedral, leaning tower and batistery. You’re going to visit there if you want to visit the monuments. Many people just lay down on the grass and have some rest during the week. In the weekend the police is a bit more strict about it.
  • Catedrale di Pisa: The main Categral. You can go there for free, but have to go to the ticket office anyway, for some reason. If you have the full ticket, you can just go in.
  • Camposanto: Right next to the catedral, it hosts the people who were buried close to the catedral. They were moved there once the square started to become what it is today. It’s an interesting place to visit if you have the full ticket, but I wouldn’t pay to visit it by itself.
  • Batistero di San Giovanni: It’s the baptistery, as the name suggests. The place is beautiful and has some interesting sound effects. Every 30 minutes, someone from the staff “sings” to show the effect on the echo. If you have the chance, stay there for a bit more than 30 minutes to listen to this.
  • Leaning tower: Of course I went there. It’s weird to see so many people taking the same pictures, it seems everyone want to be another brick in the wall. Other than that, the leaning tower itself is a nice monument and I definitely recommend going to the top. The experience of going up stairs and fighting gravity is quite interesting.
  • Piazza dei cavalieri: Is a square that contains an important university in Pisa. It is quite old too. Worth visiting.
  • Tuttomondo painting: A famous street painting in Pisa. The painter wanted to represent people dancing together. This is a guy with a television head in the center, which was the way the painter used to represent the power of the television, which was a good thing at the time (the Berlin wall was still intact), only if he knew the current situation…
  • Chiesa di Santa Maria della Spina: It’s a beautiful church (on the outside, I couldn’t really see the inside) that seems to have an original fragment of the one spine from Christ crown. It seems christians brought many “souveniers” from the crusades. 🤷‍♂️
  • Logge dei Banchi: A bank of the Medici family. It’s an interesting structure and important to the history of Pisa. Big celebrations happen there once a year.
  • San Sisto in Cortevecchia: The churt of the first saint, protector of Pisa. The church was closed when I was there, unfortunately, so I couldn’t see the inside.

Food

  • Cecina: This is a very local food that is quite cheap, it’s just bread and olive oil (IIRC) baked into the owen. I liked it.
  • A tutta pizza: It was a recommendation of the guide, it felt to me they had some sort of agreement, as Francesco gave us some Cecina for free. I had some pizzas there and I liked it. Not fancy at all, just simple food that locals like.
  • Piazza delle Vettovaglie: Quite close to the place above (from Francesco), there’s a squarre that is used for happy hours by the locals (mostly students) some good options for food that are not tourist traps.
  • La bottega del Gelato: It’s close to the river, hard to miss. They have a good variety of gelatos. They are good and cheap enough (€3), also recommended by the walking tour guide.