Florence

Florence is the city that invented the Renaissance and has been living off the interest ever since. That sounds like a criticism, but it is not. The Uffizi has Botticelli's Birth of Venus and Primavera, Caravaggio's Medusa, and rooms of Raphael and Leonardo that would be the centrepiece of any other museum in the world but here are just Tuesday. The Accademia has Michelangelo's David, which you have seen in a thousand photographs and which will still stop you in your tracks when you turn the corner and see it at full scale. The Duomo has Brunelleschi's dome, which was the largest in the world when it was built in 1436 and is still the defining shape of the Florentine skyline. All of this in a city you can walk across in 30 minutes.

The problem with Florence is that everyone knows this. The centro storico is a UNESCO site that receives 15 million visitors a year in a city of 380,000 residents, and in July and August the streets between the Duomo and the Ponte Vecchio are a slow-moving river of tour groups, selfie sticks, and people eating EUR 5 gelato that was made from a powder. The trick is timing and geography. The Uffizi at 8:15 AM on a Tuesday in October is a different experience from the Uffizi at 2 PM on a Saturday in June. The Oltrarno (the south bank of the Arno) has artisan workshops, neighbourhood trattorias, and the Palazzo Pitti with no queue, and it is a 5-minute walk across the Ponte Vecchio from the crowds.

The food is Tuscan, which means simple, seasonal, and built on bread, olive oil, and meat. A bistecca alla fiorentina (the T-bone steak, minimum 1 kg, EUR 45-60, shared between two, cooked rare over wood, do not ask for it well done) is the signature dish and it is worth the price at a good trattoria. Ribollita (bread and vegetable soup), pappa al pomodoro (bread and tomato soup), lampredotto (tripe sandwich from a street cart, EUR 4-5, the Florentine street food that tourists are afraid of and locals eat for lunch) are the daily food. A glass of Chianti Classico at a neighbourhood enoteca costs EUR 5-7 and the quality is better than what you pay EUR 15 for at home.

Florence is also small enough to use as a base. Siena is 75 minutes by bus (EUR 9, the Piazza del Campo is the most beautiful square in Italy). San Gimignano is 90 minutes (the medieval towers). The Chianti wine region starts 30 minutes south, and a day of driving through the hills, stopping at estates for tastings (EUR 10-20) and lunch at a farmhouse restaurant, is one of the best day trips in Europe. Fiesole is 25 minutes by bus 7 (EUR 1.50, Roman amphitheatre, panoramic view of Florence, and a quieter version of the Tuscan hilltop experience).