Lucca travel guide
Where to stay, the best time to visit, what a day costs, and the traps to skip.
Things to do in Lucca, planned over three days
Best time to visit Lucca
• a note or something on ✦ an occasion worth the trip
Spring is best overall, walls green, gardens at their best and ideal cycling and hiking weather.
Summer festival season with heat managed days, sights before 10.30am and again after 4.30pm.
Autumn food season, September is arguably the best month, then Comics transforms late October.
Winter is quiet, local and cheapest except Christmas and New Year, with some closures in January and February.
What's on
- Lucca Summer Festival late June-July
Major international acts play in Piazza Napoleone, book hotel and tickets together.
- Festival Puccini July-August
Open air full opera productions by Lake Massaciuccoli at Torre del Lago.
- Luminara di Santa Croce 13 September
The Volto Santo procession through streets lit by candles on every building.
- Murabilia and Verdemura spring and September editions
Plant and garden festivals using the wall bastions.
- Lucca Comics & Games Late October to 1 November
Europe's largest comics and games festival taking over the entire walled city.
- Carnevale di Viareggio February
Huge carnival parades in Viareggio, 25 minutes by train from Lucca.
Worth the trip for
Best things to do in Lucca
Mura di Lucca
A complete Renaissance wall turned into a tree lined elevated park, best cycled twice for orientation then golden hour views.
Torre Guinigi
Lucca's postcard tower with holm oaks on top and a 360 degree view over roofs, walls and hills.
Torre delle Ore
The taller, quieter tower climb, with the hand wound clock mechanism visible on the way up.
Lucca Cathedral
Romanesque cathedral holding the Volto Santo and the quietly moving Ilaria del Carretto tomb sculpture.
Puccini e la sua Lucca
A one hour nightly recital of Puccini arias in San Giovanni that ends neatly before dinner.
Puccini Museum - Casa Natale
Puccini's small birth house museum with letters, costumes and the piano he composed Turandot on.
Piazza dell'Anfiteatro
An oval piazza built into a Roman amphitheatre, best for coffee or an aperitivo while watching local life.
San Michele in Foro
Pisan Romanesque church on the old Roman forum with a towering facade topped by a winged St Michael.
Where to stay in Lucca
Inside the walls - historic centre
first trip, all-round base
The sightseeing core is also a living residential city, with everything within a 20 minute walk and evening Lucca on your doorstep.
Just outside the walls
drivers, families and longer stays
A 5 to 10 minute walk from a gate, with easier parking, larger rooms and local prices.
Lucchesi hills and Marlia-Capannori villa country
resort and villa stays with a car
Villa hotels and estates with pools, gardens and silence, 10 to 20 minutes drive from the walls.
Think twice about
- Immediate station forecourt and Viale Regina Margherita underpass late at night
Feels emptier and less cared for than the walled city. Good hotels sit a street or two away, so do not choose only for being seconds from the station.
- Piazza Napoleone front-row rooms during Lucca Summer Festival
Not unsafe but loud, with concerts and soundchecks in the square in June and July. Light sleepers should ask for a courtyard room.
- Far-out industrial and main-road strips on Via Pesciatina and the SS12 corridor
Safe but soulless and car dependent, needing buses or taxis for every meal.
Best restaurants in Lucca
Ristorante Giglio
Lucca's starred dining room serving precise modern Tuscan tasting menus in an 18th century palazzo.
Buca di Sant'Antonio
Lucca's grande dame since 1782, for tordelli, farro and pappardelle with hare in white tablecloth warmth.
Osteria da Pasquale
Warm owner led osteria with generous Tuscan cooking, caponata and a deep fairly priced wine list.
L'Angolo Tondo
Creative seasonal osteria by the amphitheatre doing something new with Tuscan ingredients, especially gnocchi.
Osteria dal Manzo
Rustic Tuscan osteria known for pici with rabbit ragù, the pasta people talk about after the trip.
Osteria Miranda
Inventive cooking for a special occasion without stiffness, with warm, sharp service.
Cantine Bernardini
Vaulted cellar dining room for testaroli and tagliolini with burrata, from the team behind Miranda.
Ristorante All'Olivo
Lucca's seafood address inside the walls, with fish driven in daily from Viareggio and Montecarlo Bianco.
Best bars in Lucca
Enoteca Vanni
Wine shop and aperitivo spot where the underground cellar is the experience, with fair priced local bottles.
Franklin '33
Speakeasy style bar for a proper cocktail after dinner in a wine city.
Outdoor things to do in Lucca
Ciclovia Puccini Lucca to Pisa
A largely traffic free flat cycle route along the Serchio from Lucca to Pisa, with a train back.
Rafting on the Lima River
Soft rafting, packrafting and canyoning on the clear Lima River, Tuscany's adventure hub near Lucca.
Orrido di Botri
A narrow wild gorge walked by wading the stream bed in a helmet to cold natural swimming pools.
Grotta del Vento
A serious show cave with guided routes through stalactite chambers and underground streams, cool all year.
Monte Croce
A waymarked Apuan summit walk, flowery in late spring, with coastal views on clear days.
Monte Sumbra
The broad dome above the Garfagnana, a real mountain day of beech and chestnut forest hiking.
Ponte della Maddalena
The Devil's Bridge, a hump backed medieval bridge with wildly unequal arches over the Serchio.
Castelnuovo di Garfagnana
Market town with the Ariosto fortress, the best Garfagnana lunch base for farro soup and necci.
Best hotels in Lucca
Grand Universe Lucca, Autograph Collection
Lucca's flagship luxury hotel in a restored palazzo facing the theatre, with a rooftop champagne bar.
Palazzo Dipinto
A 13th century palazzo turned boutique hotel with contemporary rooms and a rare private garage inside the walls.
Hotel Ilaria
A 4 star in former villa stables with generous breakfast, terrace Prosecco and free parking inside the walls.
Hotel Alla Corte degli Angeli
Small frescoed 4 star on a lane off Fillungo, with spacious individually decorated rooms and strong breakfast.
Palazzo Rocchi
Sleeping on Lucca's main square in a palazzo with frescoed ceilings, parquet and slipper baths.
Hotel San Martino
Small traditional family run hotel steps from the Duomo in the quiet south east quarter, with no lift.
B&B Anfiteatro
Family B&B overlooking the amphitheatre oval, with Fillungo 50 metres away and owners who share local tips.
B&B Arena di Lucca
Budget B&B in the amphitheatre cluster, one of the cheapest ways to sleep by the oval.
Is Lucca expensive? What a day costs
| Budget | €85 a person |
|---|---|
| Classic | €155 a person |
| Splurge | €350 a person |
A day of food, drink, sights and getting around, before the room
What to book ahead
- Torre Guinigi: a few days ahead
- Torre delle Ore: a few days ahead
- Puccini e la sua Lucca: a few days ahead
- Lucca Bikes and Bites: a few days ahead
- Ciclovia Puccini Lucca to Pisa: a few days ahead
- Rafting on the Lima River: a few days ahead
- Orrido di Botri: weeks ahead
- Monte Croce: a few days ahead
- Giglio weeks ahead, and Buca and Pasquale ahead on weekends.
- Guinigi Tower timed entry in high season and during Lucca Comics.
- Hotels inside the walls months ahead for Lucca Comics and Games.
- Lima rafting and Orrido di Botri ahead in August, and estate tastings in the wine hills.
Is Lucca safe?
- Watch bags at the station, on crowded regional trains and in Comics crowds.
- Keep valuables out of parked cars, especially at coastal stops on day trips.
- Look both ways at gate crossings where bikes, buses and cars converge.
Lucca travel tips: tourist traps to skip
- Eating on the Anfiteatro oval frontage by default, have the drink there and eat a street away.
- Doing Lucca as a rushed 3 hour day trip and missing the evening Puccini recital and the passeggiata.
- Paying luxury prices for a large group coach that gives Lucca only 60 to 90 minutes.
- Driving into the ZTL, sat nav does not outrank the varco attivo signs.
Getting around Lucca: public transport and more
- Walk and cycle inside the walls, the centre is flat, compact and largely pedestrianised.
- Trains run Lucca to Pisa in about 27 minutes, Viareggio in 25 and Florence in 75 to 90.
- Validate paper regional tickets before boarding, or use contactless or app tickets.
- Park outside the walls, the centre is a camera enforced ZTL and fines arrive per entry.
Who Lucca suits
| Solo travellers | Good |
|---|---|
| Groups of friends | Good |
| Couples | Great |
| Bachelor parties | Good |
| Families | Great |
| Bachelorette parties | Good |
Make Lucca your trip
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