Coastal towns
Coastal towns in Tuscany
20 towns
Towns on the sea. A cliff town high above the water counts here rather than under mountains, because the sea is why you would go.
Montescudaio
Province: Pisa · 242 m
A fortified hill borgo at 242 meters, named for a mountain of shields, with DOC wine since 1977 and bread, oil and grape all stamped in its identity.
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Campiglia Marittima
Province: Livorno · 231 m
A walled hilltop borgo above the Val di Cornia, where the Rocca tower watches a mining landscape worked from the Etruscans to 1976.
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Capalbio
Province: Grosseto · 217 m
A walled hilltop borgo at 217 meters in the southern Maremma, donated to the Abbey of Tre Fontane by Charlemagne.
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Castagneto Carducci
Province: Livorno · 194 m
A hilltop borgo at 194 meters above the Costa degli Etruschi, renamed for the poet Carducci in 1907 and the home of Bolgheri and Sassicaia.
Capoliveri
Province: Livorno · 167 m
A medieval hill town at 167 meters on the eastern lobe of Elba, with 35 kilometers of coast below.
Montignoso
Province: Massa-Carrara · 132 m
A Riviera Apuana commune split between the Cinquale coastal frazione, the Castello Aghinolfi on the hill, and the Lago di Porta wetland on the Versilia plain.
Seravezza
Province: Lucca · 100 m
The Versilia town where Michelangelo opened the Pope's marble quarries and Cosimo I built his summer palace.
Bibbona
Province: Livorno · 85 m
An Etruscan-origin hill village above the Costa degli Etruschi, with a Romanesque parish church and a Lorraine-built coastal fort eight kilometers down the road at Marina di Bibbona.
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Carrara
Province: Massa-Carrara · 80 m
The marble town at the foot of the Apuan Alps, with over 650 quarry sites in the valleys above and the stone that built the Pantheon, the Pietà and Michelangelo's David.
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Camaiore
Province: Lucca · 34 m
The Versilia commune that runs from the mountains to the sea, a Roman Campus Maior on the Via Francigena with a beach at its western end.
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Piombino
Province: Livorno · 21 m
A promontory port facing Elba across the channel, founded by refugees from Etruscan Populonia and now the Tuscan archipelago's ferry capital.
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Pietrasanta
Province: Lucca · 14 m
The marble-processing town under the Apuan Alps, worked by Michelangelo, Henry Moore, Joan Miró and Fernando Botero.
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Grosseto
Province: Grosseto · 10 m
The Maremma capital on the Ombrone river, ringed by hexagonal Medici walls of 1564 that now serve as the city's public park.
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Monte Argentario
Province: Grosseto · 5 m
A 635-meter peninsula tied to the mainland by three sand spits, ringed by Spanish forts and marked by Caravaggio's death in 1610.
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Castiglione della Pescaia
Province: Grosseto · 4 m
A Maremma seaside town under an Aragonese castle, with the Vetulonia necropolis behind it and Italo Calvino buried on the hill.
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Pisa
Province: Pisa · 4 m
Maritime republic on the Arno, twelve kilometers from the Ligurian Sea, with the leaning bell tower at the center of a single UNESCO-listed walled compound.
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Livorno
Province: Livorno · 3 m
Tuscany's working port and Medici-planned 'New City', a 16th-century planned town built on reclaimed coast, with a Venice-like canal quarter, the Quattro Mori monument, and a 1.5-km seafront promenade that locals call the world's most beautiful balcony.
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Orbetello
Province: Grosseto · 3 m
A town on a narrow isthmus at the center of its own lagoon, fortified by Spain in 1557.
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Forte dei Marmi
Province: Lucca · 2 m
The Versilia luxury beach built around an eighteenth-century marble-loading fort, with 99 bagni concessions and a Wednesday market that draws Milan.
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Viareggio
Province: Lucca · 2 m
The Versilia capital, a Carnival city on the Tuscan coast that turned into a Belle Époque resort when the railway arrived.
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From elsewhere in Italy
Five more towns to discover
Biccari
Province: Foggia
A Subappennino Dauno borgo at 450 meters under Monte Cornacchia, the highest peak in Puglia at 1,151 meters, with a Byzantine tower at its core.
Sirolo
Province: Ancona
A clifftop borgo at 125 meters, above the Due Sorelle sea stacks of the Adriatic.
Penne
Province: Pescara
The brick city at 438 meters between the Tavo and Fino, ancient capital of the Vestini, rebuilt after Allied bombing and awarded the Silver Medal of Civic Merit.
Palazzolo Acreide
Province: Siracusa
An 8,000-resident hilltop town on the Iblei plateau at 670m, rebuilt entirely in late Baroque after the 1693 earthquake and founded over the Greek Akrai colony in 664 BC, with a Greek theatre and a cluster of rock carvings unlike anything else nearby.
Verucchio
Province: Rimini
A spur over the lower Marecchia valley, cradle of the Villanovan civilization and birthplace of the Malatesta lordship of Romagna.