Florence Hop on Hop off Bus Tours

The tourist bus is the easiest and fastest way to visit Florence, as well as giving you a series of advantages that I'm sure you don't know about. I'll tell you about them in the following lines!

Vicky Del Moral

Vicky Del Moral

5 min read

Florence Hop on Hop off Bus Tours

Panoramic view of Florence from Piazzale Michelangelo | ©Antônia Felipe

Renaissance Florence, with 400,000 inhabitants, is not an excessively large city, but it is one of the cities with the most touristic heritage to see in Italy. Taking a tourist bus will make your stay much more comfortable.

1. The best sightseeing bus with free stops to discover Florence

Tourist bus in Florence| ©Chris Sampson
Tourist bus in Florence| ©Chris Sampson

The most comfortable and practical way to visit Florence, especially if you have little time or it is your first trip to this city that has remained unchanged since the sixteenth century, is with this tourist bus of the company Sightseeing Experience.

Thanks to it you can get an overview of the city comfortably seated and from the heights of its convertible deck making its journey of almost 2 hours or using it as a means of transport to reach the fastest and easiest way to those most important sites of the city that you want to know.

What is included in this ticket

  • Free Wi-Fi on board
  • Free "Sightseeing Experience" mobile app to listen to the audio guide in Spanish and 7 other languages while you see the city and with a recommended walking tour to discover it on your own.
  • Access to the Sightseeing Experience visitor center inside the ticket sales area at the SMN train station

Itinerary

Piazzale Michelangelo| ©OldVisor
Piazzale Michelangelo| ©OldVisor
  • Santa Croce Church
  • Palazzo Pitti
  • Piazzale Michelangelo
  • San Domenico Fiesole
  • Porta Romana
  • Convitto della Calza
  • Teatro Verdi
  • Stadio Artemio Franchi
  • Piazza della Liberta
  • Florence Station
  • Santa Maria Novella
  • Via Fiume, 8
  • Viale Giacomo Matteotti, 21
  • Piazzale Donatello, 3
  • Viale Antonio Gramsci, 13
  • Corso dei Tintori, 40
  • Verdi Viale Michelangiolo, 2
  • Piazzale Michelangelo Viale Galileo, 5
  • Viale Machiavelli
  • Viale Francesco Petrarca
  • Piazza Torquato Tasso
  • Porta San Frediano
  • Via Sant'Onofrio. Lungarno Soderini
  • Piazza Bambini di Beslan
  • Piazza della Indipendenza

Book a seat on the Florence tourist bus

2. The main points of interest in Florence

Church of Santa Croce| ©Pom'
Church of Santa Croce| ©Pom'

Piazzale Michelangelo

The best way to reach this viewpoint, one of the best in the city of Florence, is by bus. Therefore, that it is included within the route of this tourist bus is a great advantage. From Michelangelo Square, located on the plateau south of the Arno River, you will enjoy a bronze replica of Michelangelo's David and, of course, incredible panoramic views of Florence that I advise you to photograph at noon, ideal time to take the best snapshots.

Florence Duomo

The wonderful Cathedral of Florence, popularly known as Duomo and officially as Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, is one of the most important and largest churches not only in Italy, but throughout Europe.

Built over several centuries since 1296, Il Duomo is famous for its bell tower, designed by Giotto, its impressive white and green marble façade, and the bronze doors with thematic reliefs of its Baptistery, among which the 'Door of Paradise', to the east and with scenes from the Old Testament, stands out.

Dome of Santa Maria del Fiore

The incomparable dome of Santa Maria del Fiore, 114 meters high and 45 meters in diameter, deserves a special mention, which today can be visited by climbing the 463 steps that lead up to its belvedere. Its construction raised great skepticism and was a mystery for centuries, considered too large and heavy for the structure of the basilica that supports it.

However, it remains undisturbed thanks to the genius of its author, the great Filippo Brunelleschi, who spent 14 years to create it, a century after the completion of the cathedral.

Piazza del Duomo

Façade of Santa Maria del Fiore| ©Bas Wallet
Façade of Santa Maria del Fiore| ©Bas Wallet

The Cathedral of Florence is located in Piazza del Duomo, where other fundamental buildings of the city, the Battistero and the Campanile, also stand, making it the most famous place in Florence along with the Ponte Vecchio.

To round off your visit to the Duomo of Florence, besides reaching it in the most comfortable way with your tourist bus, get one of the fast-track tickets to the Florence Cathedral, as they include the entrance to its dome, baptistery, crypt and campanile without waiting. If you are interested in exploring this option further, I leave you here linked my practical guide about Florence Duomo Tickets and Tours: how to buy, prices and schedules.

Pitti Palace

Another must-see in Florence is the Palazzo Pitti, former residence of dukes, important families such as the Pitti and the Medici, of the king of Italy and even Napoleon's military barracks, now converted into an important museum.

Of great size, the exterior of this palace does not let glimpse its spectacular interior, full of galleries with the remarkable works of art that its inhabitants were collecting since its construction in 1458 and the famous Boboli Gardens, a haven of peace and beauty in the middle of Florence. The most remarkable thing about the Pitti Palace, in my opinion, are the views over the beautiful Tuscan landscape, an authentic Renaissance painting.

Church of Santa Croce

If the Duomo is the most famous and largest cathedral in Florence, the Church of Santa Croce is its most interesting temple. It is the largest Franciscan church in the world, 115 meters long and 38 meters wide, and the true pantheon of the city, with nearly 300 tombs, including the tombs of Michelangelo, Machiavelli, Lorenzo Ghiberti and Galileo Galilei.

The sculptures, paintings and frescoes inside this church, built in 1294, are truly magnificent and the work of authors such as Donatello, Giotto and Brunelleschi, among others. As the Pantheon of Florence, the Santa Croce accumulates tombstones of illustrious figures from the fourteenth to the nineteenth century.

Book a seat on the Florence sightseeing bus

3. Other interesting activities in Florence

Michelangelo's David, Accademia Gallery| ©Richard Mortel
Michelangelo's David, Accademia Gallery| ©Richard Mortel

If you found this article about how to visit Florence by tourist bus interesting, don't miss my other articles with information that will be of great help to plan your trip to this magnificent city, such as: Florence Duomo Tickets and Tours: how to buy, prices and schedules, Uffizi Gallery Tickets and Tours in Florence: how to buy, prices and schedules y Accademia Gallery Tickets and Tours in Florence: how to buy, prices and discounts.

To know in detail how to go from this city to other interesting areas, in these guides you have all the necessary information: Cinque Terre Day Trips from Florence, Siena Day Trips from Florence y Pisa Day Trips from Florence.

Book a seat on the Florence sightseeing bus