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For lovers of all things Italian there is a great deal to recommend a visit Lucca, Puccini’s birthplace, even if you are not an opera purist. This walled medieval city is one of the loveliest in Tuscany and a centre of Italian gastronomy, yet can be almost deserted in high summer during the opera season, perhaps because it’s well off the Chianti-shire trail.

Lucca: A Medieval City

Staying just outside the city walls at the comfortable and unpretentious Hotel Napoleon was a plus, since gazing upon the 16th century walls, surrounded by parkland, which ring the city is a joy in itself, especially at night. Locals stroll or bike along the top of these ancient red-brick walls, while the visitor gets to walk through them at several points to access the compact city centre.

Lucca is all piazzas, shops and churches - and what churches they are, with some of the most spectacular exteriors in the world. San Michele, built in the ornate Pisa-Romanesque style, is quite mad - soaring to crazy heights with its tiers of blind arches supported by wildly-decorated columns, no two the same. San Frediano, with its colourful mosaic facade, is another delight - and its piazza is a buzzy place to taste local wine and food or use the internet.

But the finest piazza must be the Anfiteatro in the centre - a unique, elliptical space which was converted in the 12th century from its original use as a coliseum into a residential and commercial space.

 

Food, Glorious Food

Although this is a great place to sip a coffee, or better yet, enjoy an ice cream from the Gelateria Roma, best in town, the best dining is hidden away behind the piazzas.

Down the alley behind the Roma lies a little road with three locally-recommended eateries, but it would be hard to beat the Buca San Antonio just off the Piazza San Michele, the best in town. Although Tuscany is heavily meat-oriented, it also has a great vegetable cuisine, and the Buca’s summer onion soup enriched with eggs and parmesan is out of this world.

This former haunt of Puccini and other famous figures still serves grand, old-world dishes like spit-roasted kid with artichoke pudding and roast potatoes and a cold salad of rabbit.

 

And check out the Antica Locanda dell'Angelo, a historic restaurant considered such a treasure, the city bought it when it was threatened with demolition in the 1930's.  

 

On the opposite side of the piazza are two of Lucca’s finest food shops - the Tadde.....bakery, a great place to buy the anise-flavoured rings or loaves of buccellato, perfect for dunking in sweet wine or cappuccino, and Prospero, a fine Tuscan grocer selling the premium olive oils for which Lucca is famous, beans by the sackful, perfumed green lemons, jars of local fruit and flower honeys and exquisite beefsteak tomatoes. And, indeed, farro, the Italian word for spelt.

 

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Torre del Lago

After admiring the statue of Puccini in one of Lucca's many delightful squares, and strolling on top of its city walls, you'll want to take a drive to Torre del Lago, the lakeside resort where the great opera composer moved at the height of his fame. Some of his artefacts are on display in his villa, but the star of the resort is the stage, built out over the water, and sufficiently raked and intimate to assure a decent view.

 

Puccini Opera Festival

If a night at the opera is sublime, does a visit to the composer’s birthplace to see the show staged in a breathtaking open-air setting make it more so?

 

The answer is yes - with qualifications. As a recent visit to the Puccini Opera Festival held every summer at Torre del Lago showed, you don’t generally get world-class opera in provincial locations - the real divas are busy playing La Scala or the Royal Opera house.

The well-dressed crowd is not shy to show their appreciation or displeasure - at this festival, every opera has its own artistic director, and standard of productions can vary wildly.

But whatever Torre del Lago lacks in quality control, it makes up for in charm, and there is terrific pre-show atmosphere in the lakeside trattoria da Cecco, where diners frequently burst into spontaneous tune and are tended to by - inevitably - a singing waiter.

The Other End of the Musical Spectrum

Music-lovers who fancy the sound of Lucca and surroundings but are not opera buffs should consider the Summer Festival, Lucca's rock festival held in July in the city’s large but intimate Piazza Napoleone - it attracts major names like Eric Clapton, Roger Waters and Carlos Santana. Lucca and Torre del Lago are both an easy drive from the resorts of Viareggio and trendy Forte dei Marmi, and within easy reach of low-cost flights to Pisa.

 

Don't Miss These Gardens

Another activity for fly-drivers to Lucca to enjoy is tours of a couple of amazing nearby gardens. Those of the Villa Reale in the countryside at Marli stretch on and on. One is just like an English park, another recalls Versailles while yet another is entrancingly decorated with tubs of lemon trees. Nearby at Collodi, lie the very different gardens of the Villa Garzoni. These show how even the most unpromsining land can be put to stunning use - stunning terraced gardens march up a hill at an almost vertical angle. Collodi is also famous for its Pinocchio theme park, which kids will enjoy. The Osteria Gamba Rossa next door does an excellent lunch.

 

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