Viareggio & Pietrasanta self catering holiday apartments
On this page:Self-catering accommodation in Viareggio & Pietrasanta
You can rent the Giardini del Mare Apartment, pictured below, in the most central part of Viareggio, by the sea, throughout the year.
To enquire about further details of the apartment and to make reservations, please send a message to the e-mail address below.
To combat spam, the address is an image and not text that, when clicked on, opens a link in your e-mail program, so you have to type it manually. Sorry for the inconvenience.
It's a 3-bedroomed apartment sleeping 4 people in an excellent, prime location, few yards from the main beach, right in the very centre of town. It is on the second floor of a 3-floor building, overlooking the leafy gardens of a delightful square, Piazza D'Azeglio.
On the other side of the tree-lined square is the seafront of Viareggio, with its promenade of fashionable shops, bars and restaurants. Two minutes' walk from the flat is the prestigious Viareggio yacht harbour, where the ultra-rich keep their leisure boats, with its many yachting clubs.
Here is a map of the most central part of Viareggio: the arrow shows the apartment's location.
The apartment comprises: dining room, fully equipped kitchen, small rear balcony with an extra sink, 1 twin bedroom, 2 single bedrooms, complete bathroom, front balcony directly overlooking the gardens of Piazza D'Azeglio. It's not new but it's comfortable. You can see above the building's exterior seen from the square.
Facilities include TV, washing machine, fully equipped kitchen with cooker, fridge, pots and dishes.
The added bonus of the apartment's location in Piazza D'Azeglio is that in the square is the coach station for departures to the main cities of Tuscany.
You step out of the flat and two minutes later you can catch the coach to Florence (90 minutes by coach, 1 hour by car), Pisa (20-30 minutes), Lucca (20-30 minutes), Torre del Lago Puccini with its lake and the villa where Puccini lived and the Puccini opera festival (10 minutes), and many other cities of art.
The apartment can be rented weekly from Saturday to Saturday.
Short breaks, long-term lettings and other arrangements are also available on request.
Prices
June & September: 800 euros per week
July & August: 1,000 euros per week
Other months: 600 euros per week
Included in the rental price are bedlinen, towels, all bills (electricity etc).
Last minute discounts are available.
To enquire about further details of the apartment and to make reservations, please send a message to the e-mail address below.
To combat spam, the address is an image and not text that, when clicked on, opens a link in your e-mail program, so you have to type it manually. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Pietrasanta Apartment is an apartment in the heart of Pietrasanta historical centre, few yards from the Duomo, the cathedral (pictured here).
The flat, sleeping 4, is a characteristic attic apartment with beam ceiling.
The flat comprises living room with large fireplace made in stone and beams, suitable for barbecue cooking; kitchen-dining room; 1 double bedroom; spacious bathroom with separated bathtub and shower; very large wall wardrobe; 2 storage rooms.
The apartment can be rented weekly from Saturday to Saturday.
Short breaks, long-term lettings and other arrangements are also available on request.
Prices
June & September: 400 euros per week
July & August: 500 euros per week
Other months: 300 euros per week
Included in the rental price are bedlinen, towels, all bills (electricity etc).
Last minute discounts are available.
For further details, enquiries or reservations, please e-mail the owner, the solicitor 
Avvocato Nicola Lange.
Avvocato Lange has a lawyer's office in Viareggio, in Via Garibaldi 7, and can also be contacted by phone:
Office - ++39 - 0584 - 430 493.
Mobile - ++39 - 338 - 207 6663.
About Pietrasanta town
Pietrasanta is a lovely, small Medieval town less than 2 miles from the coast of Versilia Riviera with its fashionable seaside resorts: Viareggio, Forte dei Marmi, Marina di Pietrasanta, Lido di Camaiore (see map).
At the foot of the magnificent, marble-rich Apuan Alps, Pietrasanta is a historical town where mountains and sea blend together beautifully.
The town has Roman origins and part of the Roman wall still stands.
It became important during the 15th century, mostly for its connection with marble. Michaelangelo himself, the greatest sculptor of all time, recognized the beauty of the Carrara white marble extracted from the quarries around Pietrasanta: not only did Michaelangelo use it for his own sculptures but he also worked in the marble quarries.
Today, Pietrasanta is rightly considered as the world's capital of marble working. Many internationally renowned art schools and sculpture laboratories are here.
Artists and sculptors are drawn to Pietrasanta from all over the world. Their studios mingle with small boutiques and elegant shops, wooden shutters and buildings with ochre and pink coloured facades in the deep, narrow alleyways that radiate from Piazza del Duomo.
Pietrasanta has many remarkable sites to visit, artistic buidings, churches, galleries. Its historic center is a precious jewelry case of the Middle Ages, containing the splendid Piazza Duomo.
Some of the beautiful buildings in the square are the Collegiata of San Martino, built in the 14th century, better known as the Duomo, with the bell tower from the same period, remained incomplete because never covered in marble.
A little behind is the oratory of San Giacinto, better known as the Battistero, from the 17th century.
On the same side of the square are Palazzo Moroni and the Tower of the Hours, both from the 1500s.
On the other side is the Church of Sant'Agostino, built in the 1400s, with the former Agostinian convent and cloister.
If you're interested in Viareggio, Camaiore and Lido di Camaiore hotels, you'll find them on the page Viareggio hotels of this site.
The Versilia Riviera and Versilia resorts
The Versilia Riviera is a beautiful stretch of coast, comprising several seaside resorts, in Northern Tuscany. It's on the Ligurian Sea, an arm of the Mediterranean.
It's close to many Tuscan cities of art, among which Florence, Pisa, Lucca.
Nearby is Torre del Lago Puccini, with its charming lake and the villa where the great composer Giacomo Puccini lived.
Versilia resorts are Viareggio, Lido di Camaiore, Forte dei Marmi, Marina di Pietrasanta.
Viareggio is the main centre, a town of about 60,000 inhabitants. It's not only a resort but also a major town where you can find all sorts of shops and services. 
From Viareggio in the summer you can take daily boat trips to many places, including the Cinque Terre, Portovenere, Lerici, the Bay of Poets and the isle of Elba. You can even reach Corsica: the Viareggio-Bastia-Viareggio is an annual boat race from the Versilia resort to Bastia, in Corsica, and back.
The Riviera della Versilia, as it's called in Italian, is a very popular holiday destination during the summer, when Italians leave the hot cities en masse, especially in the middle of August (the 15th of August, the day of the Ascension of the Virgin Mary, is known as Ferragosto and it's the peak of the summer holidays), and head for the seaside or the mountains. "Mare o montagna?" is a common question debated in families during those days. Luckily, Versilia has got both sea and high mountains. The Apuane Alps range of mountains (see below) is the immediate hinterland of Versilia Riviera, and forms the dramatic backdrop to its colourful, trendy beaches.
Versilia spreads across several kilometers of sandy beaches, each resort joining into the next. The beaches are covered with big umbrellas and deckchairs, belonging to the many fee-charging bathing establishments. Free beaches are few. But you are entitled to walk along the shoreline for all its length and to bathe wherever you like, even if you're not a customer of any bathing establishment.
Versilia has been famous in Italy for its nightlife since time immemorial. Its celebrated nightclubs (La Bussola is the top venue in Italy) and, more recently, discos have been synonymous with rich-kid, trendy summer fun since the beginning of the 20th century, but reached their peak in the 1960s.
Viareggio has a large and important yacht harbour. The town boasts shipyards world-renowned for the construction of yachts and leisure boats. Rich people from all over the world, like Dodi Al-Fayed, have had luxury yachts built by Viareggio shipyards.
But Viareggio is not just fashionable spots: it also possesses a prominent dimension of natural beauty. It has two vast pinewoods, one (Pineta di Ponente) on the north side of town and one on the south side (Pineta di Levante). The latter in particular is of considerable naturalistic value and is part of a protected area, the Migliarino-San Rossore National Park. The Park runs south along the coastline from Viareggio almost as far as Pisa, comprising wild beaches, often deserted, and the bush behind them, rich in pinewoods and Mediterranean vegetation. You can easily hire a bicycle to explore the beautiful paths of both Viareggio pinewoods.
Last but not least, a community of artists and writers has been part of Viareggio life for a long time.
The Apuane mountains
In the hinterland of the Versilia Riviera are the Apuane Alps. This is a range of mountains of great beauty, dramatic scenery and high and rugged peaks, hence the name "Alps", due to the resemblance with the real Alps. In fact, they are an offshoot of the Appennines, the mountain range that runs through peninsular Italy for all its length.
The Apuane (see picture) are very close to the coast; their blue and white silhouette dominates the scenery from Viareggio beach and sea.
The Apuane Alps are rich in marble, the white, world-famous Carrara marble, which has been extracted from open quarries in the side of the mountains for many centuries, since Roman times. Marble from the Apuane Alps was used by Michaelangelo to sculpt his masterpieces, and the great artist himself worked in the quarries for some time.
The medieval town of Pietrasanta, in Versilia, is an important center of quarrying companies and a thriving international artists' colony: visitors have included Henry Moore and Fernando Bottero. Marble is the backbone of the local economy of Pietrasanta, with 115 companies involved in quarrying and selling the white Carrara marble.
Viareggio Carnival
Very famous is the Viareggio Carnival, a 16-day period of fun during the Mardi Gras festivities. It takes place in February and March.
Like other renowned carnivals in Italy, notably the Venice Carnival, it's characterized by visual displays of high artistic level.
Artistic floats big and small that took a whole year to build, created by artists with the help of craftsmen, are then paraded on the seafront on four different dates, called "corsi mascherati".
The floats are very colourful, full of humour and irony in the true Carnival spirit, often with a satirical intent: this is why they are called "carri allegorici". 
Two floats from Viareggio Carnival are pictured here: the one above is a caricature or parody of Nobel-laureate playwright Dario Fo, the one below of the provocative singer Renato Zero.
People wear masks, kids turn up in fancy dresses, and at night everybody dances in the streets and has a good time.
The Carnival of Viareggio dates back a couple of centuries, but officially it started in the 1870s, and has been repeated every year since, looked forward to with great expectation by the locals.
See also Rapallo hotels | Camogli hotels | Santa Margherita Ligure hotels | Cinque Terre hotels