FIRENZE CARD

You're planning to visit Florence and stay here three or more days?? Do you like the artistic and cultural heritage of Florence?? Do you want to visit as much museums as you can in three days but you think this will be expensive for you?? Do you want to travel for free in the public buses??

ALL YOU NEED IS A CARD

50€ / 72H / 33 MUSEUMS / FREE BUS&TRAM

The "Firenze Card" is promoted by the Municipality of Florence, the Ministry of Arts and Cultural Activities, the Regional Direction of Cultural Heritage, the Special Superintendece for Historical Artistic and Ethnic-anthropological Heritage and the Museum Circuit of Florece, the Chamber of Commerce of Florence and ATAF (Florentine public buses company).
The Firenze Card has a validy of 72 hours/€ 50.00 and gives you free admission to 33 museums in Florence. You will have a total access in the museums, including permanent collections, exhibitions and other activities without further costs. EU citizens under 18 years old accompaying the holder of the Card can enter for free.

Where to buy the Card:
You can buy the Firenze Card on line here - http://www.firenzecard.it/index.php?option=com_cardfi&view=cardfi&task=dutente&tipoc=1&lang=en  and then with the voucher you can go to take your Card in one of the stores below, or you can buy the Card direcktly in one of this stores:

Museo di Santa Maria Novella - Biglietteria - Piazza Santa Maria Novella
Palazzo Pitti - Biglietteria centrale - Piazza Pitti, 1
Ufficio Informazioni Turistiche - Piazza Stazione, 4
Ufficio Informazioni Turistiche - Via Cavour, 1
Museo di Palazzo Vecchio - Biglietteria - Piazza della Signoria
Museo Bardini - Via dei Renai, 37
Cappella Brancacci - Piazza del Carmine, 14
Museo Nazionale del Bargello - Via del Proconsolo, 4
Galleria degli Uffizi - Gate 2 biglietteria - Piazzale degli Uffizi

How to use
The card can be used only one time in each museum during the 72 hours validity. Access to museums such as the Uffizi Gallery and the Accademia Gallery can recive delays depending on the number of visitors.
The Card si striktly personal and non transferable: the museum clerks and public transport employees may ask for your ID card. Firenze Card is not refundable, even if some museums are closed for exeptional reasons. Check the web site of the museums before you buy the card. Take care of your card, lost card cannot be reissued. If your card is damaged or does not work properly, the sale office can replace it only if it is not already expired.
To use the card on the buses you just have to swiped it against the validation machine.

How to activate
The Firenze Card is activated on your first visit to a museum or on your first use in a public bus. So then you have 72h to visit the museums in the list below:

Museo di Palazzo Vecchio - Piazza della Signoria
Museo Stefano Bardini - Via dei Renai, 37
Palazzo Medici Riccardi - Via Cavour, 3
Museo di Santa Maria Novella - Piazza Santa MAria Novella
Cappella Brancacci - Piazza del Carmine, 14
Fondazione Salvatore Romano - Piazza Santo Spirito, 29
Cappelle Medicee - Piazza Madonna degli Aldobrandini, 6
Galleria degli Uffizi - Piazzale degli Uffizi, 6
Galleria dell'Accademia - Via Ricasoli, 58/60
Galleria Palatina e Appartamenti Reali - Piazza Pitti, 1
Galleria d'Arte Moderna - Piazza Pitti, 1
Museo Giardino di Boboli - Piazza Pitti, 1
Museo degli Argenti - Piazza Pitti, 1
Museo delle Porcellane - Piazza Pitti, 1
Galleria del Costume - Piazza Pitti, 1
Museo Archeologico - Piazza Santissima Annunziata 9b
Museo dell'Opificio delle Pietra Dure - Via degli Alfani, 78
Palazzo Davanzati - Via Porta Rossa, 13
Museo di San Marco - Piazza San Marco, 3
Museo del Bargello - Via del Proconsolo, 4
Cenacolo Andrea del Sarto - Via di San Salvi, 16
Cenacolo del Ghirlandaio - Borgo Ognissanti 42
Cenacolo del Fuligno - Via Faenza 42
Cenacolo di Sant'Apollonia - Via XXVII Aprile, 1
Orsanmichele - Via Arte della Lana, 1
Villa Medicea della Petraia - Via della Petraia, 40
Villa Medicea di Castello - Via di Castello, 47
Museo di Casa Martelli - Via Zannetti, 8
Collezione Contini Bonacossi - Via Lambertesca, 6
Villa Corsini a Castello - Via della Petraia, 38
Villa Medicea e Museo Storico della caccia e del territorio - Via dei Ponti Medicei, 7 Cerreto Guidi
Villa Medicea - Piazza dei Medici, 14 Poggio a Caiano



GETTING AROUND FLORENCE BY BUS

I organize my sightseeing geographically and do it all on foot. So this is what I suggest you: walk a lot. Florence buses dont cover the old centre very well.

Of the many bus lines, I think that the most value for sightseeing are: lines # 7, 10, 12, 13, 31 and 32 which connect the train station with the Piazza San Marco through Piazza Indipendenza. Bus #7 continuoes on to the Piazza della Libertà and then on to Fiesole.
Lines #12 and #13 go from the train station to Porta Romana, up to San Miniato Church and Piazzale Michelangelo, and on to Santa Croce Church.

Here you have a map will all the bus lines. I find it very useful.

Fun little elettrico minubuses wind through the old centre of the town and up and down the river. Line A gets around the centre from the train station to Piazza Beccaria, Line B goes up and down the Arno river from Borgo Ognissanti to Santa Croce Church while Line D goes from the train station to Ponte Vecchio (Old Bridge), cruising through the Oltrarno neighborhood and finishing at Ponte San Niccolò. You'll be sitting with local seniors in this buses.

I suggest to buy ticets at the bars, the tabacchi shops, newsstands or at the train station bus stop, €1,20 for 90 minutes, €4,50/4 tickets, €5,00/daily, €10,00/12 tickets, €20,00/25 tickets, €12,00/ 3 days ticket. As you get on the bus you have to validate your ticket in the machine onboard. Tickets bought on board costs €2,oo for 90minutes. Usually you board at front or rear doors and exit from the central doors.

Hop-on, hop-off bus tours generally stops at major sights. Around town you will see this big double-decker sightseeing buses near major sights. Tourists on the top deck can listen to brief recorded descriptions of the attractions, snap photos, and enjoy the drive-by-look.

Tickets costs €20,00 for 24h, firs bus at 9.30 am and last bus at 6.00pm . Pay as you're on board, tickets include two bus lines - Blue is one hour with a trip up to the Piazzale Michelangelo, Green is 2 hours with a side trip to Fiesole. For more informations visit http://www.firenze.city-sightseeing.it/ 

As the name says, you can hop off when you want and get on the nex bus (every 30 minutes). Hop-on stops include the train station, the Duomo, Pitti Palace, Santa Croce, Piazzale Michelangelo, Fiesole and many other sights.

As more sights are situated in the old city center this big buses can't go, so before look at the route map.

You may find this a funny thing but I find this very useful: In Florence You can buy tickets with an simple SMS from your mobile phone send a text message with writen "Ataf" at this number +39 339 9941264 and you will recieve an electronic ticket to show to the ticket inspector. The cost of the ticket is €1,20 for 90 minutes + the cost of the text message depending on your mobile phone operator. To do this you have to ger registerd to http://www.bemoov.it/ and give a credit card number from where the Florentine buses company will charge the cost of your ticket. For more informations check the buses company website http://www.ataf.net/ or call the toll free number 800-424500 (from fixed lines) or the payment number
199-104245 (from mobile phones).

Also I find it very useful to know the exact time the bus will come at the bus stup. You just have to send an SMS to +39 3424112512 with the number of the bus and the bus stop code (you will find it at the bus stop sign). For more information visit www.temporealeataf.it .

PALATINA GALLERY OF PALAZZO PITTI

Hello guys,
yesterday evening I went to visit the Palatina Gallery - situated inside the Pitti Palace.
Find here some important informations about the Gallery...

Address: Piazza Pitti, 1
               50123 - Firenze

Tickets: Full €8,50 (but mandatory special exhibitions often raise the price to € 12)
             Reduced € 4,25
             Includes entrance to Gallery of Modern Arts

Opening hours: From Tuesday to Sunday - 8.14 am to 6.50 pm
                         Closed on mondays

Getting there: The Pitti Palace is located several blocks southwest of the Ponte Vecchio, in the Oltrarno neighborhood

Phopography is not permited in the Palatine Gallery.


The Palatine Gallery occupies the whole left wing of teh first floor of the Pitti Palace, which was the residence of the medici Grand Dukes. In 1828, when Tuscany goes under the rules of the Lorraine family, the most important paintings in the Palace were hung in the Gallery and opened to public. it is an impressive collection comprising works of painters like Raphael, Titian, Correggio, Rubens, Pietro da Cortona, Caravaggio, Van Dyck, Sanzio and many others.

The Gallery seems like a private picture gallerywith a sumptuous combinations of lavish interior decorations and the rich picture frames oredered by the Medici family. The Palatine Gallery layout follows no order. You can find paintings of different period or painting of different size hanged together in the same room. This is great!

The rooms occupied by the Gallery overlooking the Pitti square were frescoed by Pietro da Cortona (1596-1669) with an imposing decorative cycle wich make use of teh classical myth to allude to life and education of the one of the most important examples of the Baroque style in Florence and provide a splendid framework for the 16th to 18th century.

From the Palatine Gallery, the visit continues through the Royal Appartments, fourteen magnificent rooms, which were the home of the MEdici and Lorraine families and, from 1865, of the king of Italy during the brief period that Florence was capital city of Italy. Three historical moments and styles are seen side by side in these series of rooms, giving a sense of the growth of the palace over a long period of time.

Suggestions: Seeing all the Palatine Gallery, the Museum of Modern Arts and the Boboli Gardens is imposible, and choosing where to spend your time can be confusing. In my opinion, i reccomend sticking to the Palatine Gallery, which has the paintings collection, plus the sumptuous room of the Royal Apartments. The painting pick up where the Uffizi leaves off, at the High Renaissance. Lovers of Raphael's Madonnas and Titian's portraits will find some of the world'sbest at the Pitti Palace.

Below some of the painting and pictires and directions to Pitti Palace....

View of Florence with the Cathedral and the Old Palace

Caravaggio - Bambino che dorme

Fra Bartolomeo - Compianto sul Cristo morto

View of Florence by night

Cesare Augusto

Cesare Chini - Festa dell'ultimo dell'anno a Bangkok 1913

Giovanni Bastianini - Pescatorello

Giovanni Fattori - Maremma Toscana

Giovanni Fattori - Il salto delle pecore 1887