Pisa, Italy in One Day
Pisa is a small beautiful city in Italy, in a few hundred meters, there are truly unique works and monuments, first of all the famous leaning tower.
If you want to visit this city, let’s discover together what to see in Pisa in a walking itinerary.
Table of Contents
Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II and Tuttomondo murals of Keith Haring
Arriving from Pisa Centrale station, after a few meters you come across this elliptical square, recently redeveloped. In the center stands the statue dedicated to the king of Italy.
Here you can see several important buildings, such as the Post Office and the Provincial Palace.
A stone’s throw away is the Church of S. Antonio, whose external wall is immediately noticeable for a real explosion of color. I’m talking about the largest mural in Europe, Keith Haring’s Tuttomondo. If you love street art, this work is one of the unmissable things to see in Pisa in one day.
The work was created in 1989 on the external wall of the rectory of the church and is the last public work of the American artist before his death. The mural, of considerable size, measures approximately 180 square meters, 10 meters high by 18 meters wide.
The mural shows thirty figures joined together to represent world peace. In the center, in ochre, stands out the Pisan cross, formed by four linked figures.
Nearby is Kobra’s mural on Via Silvio Pellico, which depicts Galileo looking through a telescope (actually the Leaning Tower).
Italy Course
From Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II begins Corso Italia, the main street of Pisa. It is a shopping street, full of bars and shops of all kinds.
Along Corso Italia, you will find the Church of S. Domenico and the Church of S. Maria del Carmine, with a rather simple interior but a very pretty cloister.
Walking towards the bridge, you will see the Logge di Banchi, a large structure built in the 17th century to house the wool and silk market. Next to the Logge is the Palazzo Pretorio, with a clock tower rebuilt after the bombings during the war.
Lungarni
While the crowd will already be gathered in Piazza dei Miracoli, we can calmly enjoy the streets that run along the Arno. The Lungarni of Pisa is a place loved by the citizens, a meeting point with bars and clubs.
Coming from Corso Italia, even before crossing the Ponte di Mezzo, I recommend turning left onto Lungarno Gambacorti.
Walk until you come across a small white church in Gothic style. Among the things to see in Pisa in one day, is the Church of S. Maria della Spina.
Church of Santa Maria della Spina
After crossing the Solferino Bridge, you will immediately notice this small church on the left, an important example of Pisan Gothic. The church was built in 1230 on the Arno riverbed near an important bridge, the Ponte Novo, which connected the streets of Santa Maria and Sant’Antonio, destroyed during the 15th century and never rebuilt.
Given its proximity to the bridge, the church was initially named Santa Maria del Pontenovo, but changed its name to S. Maria della Spina when, starting in 1333, the church housed a thorn from Christ’s crown as a relic, now exhibited in the church of S. Chiara.
The recently restored church is open to visitors for a few days a week, although there is no information on site about it.
Inside you can admire the notable “Madonna della Rosa” by Andrea and Nino Pisano, the other furnishings that remain in the church, and the temporary exhibitions that are sometimes hosted there.
Right next to the church is the bridge where the Gioco del Ponte takes place on the last Saturday of June, a historical reenactment that is very popular in Pisa.
There are more than 700 costumed figures who lend themselves to a Historical Procession and the Battle, where teams belonging to rival neighborhoods (the troops of Tramontana and Mezzogiorno, the two neighborhoods divided by the bridge) face each other in tests of strength that consist of pushing the opposing team off the bridge!
And it is always from this bridge that you have the best view of San Renieri, on the night of June 16, when all the lungarni are illuminated by more than 100,000 candles creating a fantastic effect!
Palazzo Blu
Palazzo Giuli Rosselmini Gualandi, called Palazzo Blu for the color of its facade, is today a museum with rich permanent collections of paintings and other works of art by Italian artists from the 16th to the 20th century. The tour also includes valuable furniture and ancient coins and sections occupied by temporary exhibitions that can concern any topic, from science to cinema.
Garibaldi Square and Borgo Stretto
On the opposite side of the Ponte di Mezzo there is Piazza Garibaldi waiting for us, with the bronze statue of the famous leader. Here I stopped in the afternoon for a relaxing beer with a view of the river.
From Piazza Garibaldi begins Borgo Stretto, one of the oldest neighborhoods in Pisa. A pleasant walk under the arcades that characterize this street, full of historic shops and cafes, overlooking medieval buildings that belonged to nobles and merchants.
It is also worth wandering into the side streets that cross the road, to discover hidden corners and characteristic little squares, such as Piazza delle Vettovaglie, where the market has always been held.
Botanical Garden and Botanical Museum of Pisa
From Piazza dei Cavalieri, continuing along Via Corsica, you can quickly reach the Botanical Garden of Pisa. This garden was founded in 1543 by the naturalist, doctor, and botanist Luca Ghini (1490-1556) and is the first university botanical garden in the world.
The botanical garden was originally located on the banks of the Arno River but was moved to its current location in 1591. The garden is home to plants from all over the world; in addition to the most well-known succulent plants and aromatic herbs, it also hosts some centuries-old trees and rare plants from the five continents.
The Botanical Museum of Pisa preserves 17th-century portraits of famous botanists, but also objects related to teaching such as botanical models in wax and plaster and watercolored teaching tables.
It is also possible to take part in a multimedia guided tour of the historic plant collections of the Herbarium (Herbarium Horti Botanici Pisani), preserved in the Palazzo al Centro dell’Orto Botanico and accessible only to scholars, upon reservation.
Square of Miracles
A walking itinerary of Pisa must certainly include Piazza dei Miracoli (or, better, Piazza del Duomo), listed among the UNESCO World Heritage Sites in 1987. The monuments that you can visit in this enormous green square are the Duomo, the Baptistery, the Monumental Cemetery, and, of course, the Tower.
These are the monuments that constitute the heart of the religious life of the city, defined as “miracles” by the Italian poet Gabriele d’Annunzio in 1910 for their extreme beauty and particularity. This is where the improper name of Piazza dei Miracoli comes from.
Here stands the famous Leaning Tower, the Cathedral of S. Maria Assunta, the Monumental Cemetery, and the Baptistery of S. Giovanni.
Leaning Tower
It goes without saying that the Leaning Tower is one of the things to absolutely see in Pisa, even just for a quick visit to the city.
The Bell Tower or Tower of Pisa is one of the most famous monuments in the world and attracts crowds of visitors from all continents every year. If you are wondering if the tower really leans, all you have to do is check it out for yourself; passing between the tower and the Cathedral, you can admire the inclination of the bell tower in its maximum expression.
The construction of the tower began in 1173, with the aim of creating a circular tower like the Baptistery and visible from every place in the Pisan plain.
Only five years after the start of construction, the ground began to subside and after numerous attempts to straighten the work, the tower was completed around 1380.
The slope of the tower has become increasingly evident over the centuries and between 1990 and 2001 the tower was subjected to important consolidation works.
If you have no problems walking, I suggest you take the 294 steps to the top as the effort is rewarded with a beautiful 360° view of the city.
Cathedral of S. Maria Assunta
The cathedral is dedicated to Santa Matia Assunta in honor of the victorious battle of Palermo that took place between 13 and 18 August 1063, the year in which the construction of the building began.
It is an imposing and magnificent structure, right in the center of Piazza dei Miracoli, which is accessed from the side facing the baptistery and even the entrance facade alone is worth a visit. In fact, the facade is a masterpiece by Rainaldo, developed on blind arches, decorated with lozenges and inlays, surmounted by four orders of accessible loggias.
I would also like to point out two beautiful works that you should spend a few minutes looking at.
The first is the pulpit by Giovanni Pisano, made between 1302 and 1310 and consisting of eight columns depicting scenes from the Old and New Testaments.
The second is the apse mosaic depicting “Christ Enthroned between the Virgin and Saint John”, which Cimabue also worked on and which, due to its colors, is very reminiscent of the famous Byzantine mosaics.
The Cathedral hosts numerous valuable works that you can discover during your visit, but among these, there are two really interesting ones that I want to mention:
- Galileo Galilei’s lamp: in the center of the nave hangs a bronze chandelier, this reproduction recalls the chandelier that Galileo Galilei observed in the Cathedral in 1581, at the age of 17 and that allowed him to formulate the theory known as pendulum isochronism.
- The Pisan New Year: inside the Cathedral, near the string course above Giovanni Pisano’s Pulpit, a shelf appears supported by an oval figure similar to a vase. Every year, on March 25 at 12:00, the shelf is hit by a ray of sun that enters from a small window located on the southern transept. This event determines the passage from the old to the new year 9 months in advance. In fact, this New Year follows the “Incarnation Style” calendar which calculates the days of the year using March 25 as the first day, the day of Jesus’ conception, or the feast of the Annunciation.
Baptistery of St. John
The Baptistery of San Giovanni is located right in front of the entrance to the Cathedral and its construction began in 1153. Its important dimensions make it the largest baptistery in the world it is about 55 meters high and has a circumference of 107.24 meters.
Inside the baptistery, you can admire the pulpit by Nicola Pisano from 1260, which is considered the most representative work of art of the Italian 13th century. The work rises on seven columns, supported by lions, and shows in the panels the life of Jesus from the Annunciation to the Last Judgement.
The baptistery is also famous for its important acoustic characteristics. The echo effect that spreads inside the structure suggests the presence of a choir.
Curious is the ritual of the high school graduates who gather one hundred days before the exam and do as many laps around the Baptistery as the number of grades they would like to get. A great way to stay in shape, right?
Monumental Cemetery
The Monumental Cemetery (Camposanto in the Italian language) is a sacred place because the Crusaders brought the holy land taken from Mount Golgotha here. For centuries, the most important figures in Pisan history have been buried here.
The name Camposanto is linked to the fact that the structure contains the holy land brought from Palestine at the time of the Second Crusade (1146).
In the 19th century, the ancient cemetery was rearranged: all the sarcophagi were moved inside under the arches. Exploring this place we notice the richness of the frescoes, whose sinopias, or preparatory drawings in red lime, are preserved in the Sinopia Museum, included in the entrance ticket.
Another reason why you should visit the Monumental Cemetery is its splendid architectural structure in white marble. Simple in form but extremely precise and refined, designed to create with the numerous arches a succession of perspective games both in the internal galleries and towards the outside, for example observing Piazza dei Miracoli from its main entrance.
Knights Square
Returning to the starting point, it is necessary to make a stop in this historic square. Not only to immortalize the carriages that carry tourists around or listen to the street musicians who exhibit their pieces but above all to admire the buildings that characterize the suggestive Piazza dei Cavalieri, one of the things to see in Pisa in a day.
It takes its name from the Headquarters of the Order of the Knights of St. Stephen, commissioned by Cosimo De Medici, and has been the seat of the city’s power for centuries. Today it houses the prestigious Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, inside the Palazzo della Carovana, a jewel seen from the outside.
Also interesting is the Palazzo dell’Orologio which incorporates the so-called Torre della Muda, or della Fame. Here, as Dante’s Divine Comedy says, Count Ugolino della Gherardesca, his sons and grandsons were imprisoned. The archbishop gave the order to throw the key of the prison into the Arno and let them die of hunger.
What to see around Pisa
If you are in Pisa for several days, do not miss the opportunity to visit the surroundings. Among the closest attractions, there is certainly the city of Lucca, which is less than 20 km away.
If you visit during the carnival period, you cannot miss going to Viareggio (23 km), where the most famous carnival in Italy takes place.
If you have more time available, about 50 km away are the village of the towers of San Gimignano and the lands of Chianti.
How to get to Pisa:
If you arrive by plane, you should know that Pisa airport is close to the city center.
You can reach the Central Train Station and from there move around on foot, since you are practically in the center!
To reach the Central Station you can use the Pisa Mover (it leaves just outside the Airport and in 5 minutes takes you to the Station, the ticket price is 5 euros each way).
Another valid and cheaper alternative is the bus line.
400 meters from the airport is the S. Agostino 1 stop. From there passes the Lam Verde which in 2 minutes and 5 stops and at a cost of 1.80 euros takes you to the station.
If you don’t have luggage, you can also take a nice walk and in about twenty minutes you are in front of the Central Station, practically in the center.
If you arrive by train you will be very comfortable.
In front of the Central Station of Pisa begins Corso Italia, a street full of shops that will take you straight to the Ponte di Mezzo.
On foot from the station, you can reach Piazza dei Miracoli with a pleasant walk of about twenty minutes.
If you arrive by car, you should use the Pisamover Park & Shuttle service.
It has affordable prices that include parking and the shuttle to the central station.
Read Next:
