CRUISE SERVICES

These services have been selected to give all cruise ship passengers porting in Livorno (Tuscany) the opportunity to discover the beauties of our region. When your cruise ship ports in Livorno early in the morning, you will have the possibility to utilise one of our full day tours, which have been studied to allow you to discover and appreciate the highlights and marvels of Tuscany in approximately 10 hours. All the services chosen by you will leave the dock of Livorno at 8.00am and shall return at approximately 6.00pm at your ship. Our drivers shall wait for you in front of your ship with a sign with your name written on it. All services shall be carried out by multi-lingual drivers who can offer languages such as:- English, Spanish, Portughese, and of course Italian.

SHORE EXCURSIONS:

ITINERARY N° 1 – FLORENCE AND PISA

Leave Livorno at 8.00am. Arrive in Florence approx. 9.00am. If you have requested any ticket reservations from us to see Michelangelo’s David statue (located in the Accademia Gallery) this will be your 1st destination. After seeing the museum, you will visit the most loved Church of the Florentines:- SANTA CROCE CATHEDRAL, where inside you will admire the tombs of the great Florentines such as MICHELANGELO, ROSSINI, MACHIAVELLI, GALILEO GALILEI. Etc.

And still inside the cathedral you can also visit the oldest leather factory in the world (yes you have read correctly; it’s actually part of the cathedral!). This unique place is the only one of it’s kind in the Catholic world where the Vatican State does not object to having a store in a Church! In fact the Franciscan Friars in the 1200’s were the ones who started the treatment of leather in Tuscany. Naturally here you will have the chance to buy the most genuine and traditional Florentine leather such as bags, wallets, leather jackets etc. Depending on how busy it is, you may also have the possibility to see the demonstration of how the leather is decorated with gold leaf prints. After visiting these destinations, it will be around lunch time.  On request we can reserve a table for you at some of our selected restaurants, where you will spend approx. 30 euro per person (depending on which wine you order, some bottles in the restaurant can be very expensive and of course in this case 30 euro will not be enough). Remember that in Italy while you are in a restaurant no-one is in a rush! And therefore it may take longer to eat and as you know time flies when you are having fun! After lunch you will visit the famous PONTE VECCHIO (OLD BRIDGE), PALAZZO PITTI (THE FORMER MEDICI RESIDENCE), and the DUOMO (THE LARGEST CATHEDRAL IN FLORENCE). You will pass by in front of these monuments as entering may take too much time. Remember that to visit inside the Duomo it is not possible to make advance reservations. If you are interested to visit inside you will have to wait in line, sometimes up to 1 hour! Then we will proceed to a fantastic viewpoint where you can see all of Florence from above, at the MICHELANGELO SQUARE. At approx. 3.30pm you will leave Florence to go to Pisa, where you will arrive at 4.30pm in the famous square of miracles, where all of the most beautiful monuments of Pisa are located. (THE LEANING TOWER, THE CATHEDRAL AND THE BAPTISTRY). At approx 5.15pm you will leave Pisa for Livorno, where you will arrive in front of  your ship at approx 6.00pm.

ITINERARY N° 2 – FLORENCE AND CHIANTI

The 1st part of this tour to Florence is identical to itinerary n°1, up until visiting the Santa Croce Cathedral. After seeing the church, instead of eating lunch in Florence you will taken to the beautiful Chianti countryside, where you will visit first the small hamlet of MONTEFIORALLE, a lovely little town with less than 100 inhabitants perched on top of a hill overlooking Greve. In this ancient town you will see the former residence of the famous explorer AMERIGO VESPUCCI, who gave the name to AMERICA. After visiting this village, we will proceed to Greve, the capital town of Chianti, where you will visit the beautiful square and have the chance to do some shopping for traditional handcfafted items. Then we will proceed to local winery where we can taste some of the famous CHIANTI CLASSICO wine, along with other local products such as BALSAMIC VINEGAR, VIN SANTO (DESSERT WINE), GRAPPA (DISTILLED ALCOHOL) AND EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL.  Here you can also have a guided tour of the wine cellar and of the balsamic vinegar production area. On request it is possible to eat lunch at this winery in their beautiful trattoria, weather permitting on their wonderful pergola terrace, overlooking the vineyards of chianti. In the case of bad weather, there are 2 spacious rooms inside the 17th century building. Here you can eat fresh pasta, perhaps with a wild boar sauce or ravioli with walnut sauce or even tagliatelle with porcini mushroom sauce. For second course they offer a wide selection of typical meats eg steak, beef,  lamb, chicken, wild boar, veal etc. Then for dessert you cannot miss the famous Bruna’s apple pie (Bruna is the chef and also the mother of the winemaker and owner of the winery) with vanilla ice cream and a few drops of their balsamic vinegar (the real one aged 30 years!). Depending on which wine you choose the price for a complete meal will be approx 35 euro per person. After lunch we will continue along the chianti wine trail (CHIANTIGIANA) to arrive at the famous Sienese fortress town called CASTELLINA IN CHIANTI. Here you can walk through the village and pass through the medieval passage used by the soldiers from Siena during the fighting with Florence in the 14th century. Here you will have time for a gelato if you still have room in your stomach! Then at 4pm we will leave to go back to the ship where we will arrive at approx 6pm. PLEASE NOTE THAT ON MONDAYS ALL MUSEUMS AND WINERIES ARE CLOSED FOR WEEKLY DAY OFF. Of course restaurants are open, along with churches and cathedrals and so lunch can still be arranged in another location.

 

                                      HOW TO BOOK

Try to click on BOOKING from the home page. If this service is temporarily unavailable there will be UNDER CONSTRUCTION written there. This is due to our constant upgrading of the banking and booking online service. Should this occur it is necessary for you to send us your credit card information (card number, expiry date, name of cardholder and type of card eg VISA, AMEX, ETC). You can either send us an email with this information, or if you prefer, send us a fax at the following number:- +39 0558790358, attention of GUIDO SARZANI. PLEASE NOTE THAT YOUR CREDIT CARD WILL NOT BE CHARGED, IT ONLY SERVES AS A GUARANTEE TO CONFIRM YOUR BOOKING. YOUR CREDIT CARD DATA WILL NEVER BE USED FOR OTHER PURPOSES OTHER THAN TO RESERVE OUR SERVICES. After we have verified that your credit card information is valid, we will send you an email of confirmation of your booking.

                                       CANCELLATION POLICY

If for any reason you wish to cancel your booking with us the following conditions apply:-

 If for any reason your ship cannot dock at the port of Livorno on the date of your booking (please be sure of the exact arrival date in Livorno of your ship before booking with us) due to adverse weather conditions, epidemic on board, change of route of the ship etc etc. IN THESE OCCASIONS THE CANCELLATION OF YOUR TOUR DUE TO CONDITIONS OUTWITH YOUR CONTROL, NO CANCELLATION CHARGES WILL APPLY.

                                       HOW TO PAY

After you receive from us the confirmation of the services and details regarding the cost of your tour, please proceed to pay the driver  at the end of your tour. PLEASE NOTE THAT PAYMENT IS ACCEPTED ONLY IN EURO CASH OR EURO TRAVELLERS CHEQUES.

INCLUDED  -  FUEL, PAY TOLLS, PARKING, PERMIT IN CENTRE OF TOWNS, TICKET RESERVATION (ON REQUEST)

NOT INCLUDED – GRATUITIES, LUNCH, MUSEUM ENTRANCES, TICKETS, CHURCH ENTRANCES WHERE APPLICABLE

PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL OUR SERVICES WILL BE CARRIED OUT USING NEW VEHICLES (MERCEDES AND VOLKSWAGEN MINIVANS) WITH 8 PASSENGER CAPACITY, ALL WITH AIR CONDITIONING, AIRBAGS, ABS AND ALL THE LATEST SAFETY FEATURES. OUR STAFF ARE ALL HIGHLY QUALIFIED, PUNCTUAL AND PROFESSIONAL WITH A DEEP KNOWLEDGE OF THE HISTORY OF OUR REGION.