Pisa International Airport to Viareggio
About 30 km north; the train via Pisa Centrale takes around 40 minutes for €9–12, and a taxi is €55–75.
A long Art Nouveau seafront on the Versilia coast, with rows of numbered beach clubs, a February carnival of enormous papier-mâché floats, and pine forest running behind the town.
Every way to get there
Our verdict: for Viareggio, a private transfer is the easiest door-to-door option (from €30). Travelling light on a budget? The bus is cheapest (from €6) but slower, with a change in the city.
What it costs for your group
The bus is charged per person, while a taxi or private transfer is one price for the whole car — so the more of you there are, the better door-to-door value looks.
| Group | Bus (per person) | Private transfer | Best value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Solo · 1 traveller | €6 | €30 | Bus |
| Couple · 2 travellers | €12 | €30 | Bus |
| Family of 4 · 4 travellers | €24 | €30 | Bus |
Which option should you choose?
| If your priority is… | Our pick | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Lowest price | Bus | From €6, though slower with a change in the city. |
| Speed & comfort | Private transfer | Door-to-door, fixed price, a driver waiting for you. |
| A group of 3–4 | Transfer or taxi | One flat fare splits cheaper than several bus tickets. |
| A late-night arrival | Transfer or taxi | Both run 24/7 when buses and the tram have stopped. |
By transport mode
Train
Around ten euros and the standard route. The same line continues to Forte dei Marmi and the rest of the Versilia coast, which is how most people move along it.
Where to catch it: PisaMover to Pisa Centrale, then a northbound coastal train; Viareggio station is about fifteen minutes' walk from the seafront.
Best for budget travellers near a stationTaxi
Reasonable for a group heading to a seafront hotel, since the walk from Viareggio station with luggage is longer than it looks on a July afternoon.
Where to catch it: Thirty-five minutes up the coast; agree the fare before departure.
Best for small groups in a hurryBus / shuttle
Cheaper than the train but considerably slower and less frequent. Only worth it if the timings happen to align.
Where to catch it: Regional buses run up the coast from Pisa, with a change from the airport bus or PisaMover first.
Best for solo & budget travellersCar rental
Useful for reaching the marble quarries at Carrara or the hill towns above the coast, both of which are poorly served by public transport.
Where to catch it: Straightforward road north; beachfront parking is metered and fills early in summer.
Best for travellers who want to exploreViareggio & Pisa in photos
Buying tickets in Pisa
Pisa's connection is the best-engineered of any airport in this guide. The PisaMover is a driverless elevated shuttle running to Pisa Centrale in five minutes for €6, every 5–10 minutes from around 06:00 to midnight — no timetable to memorise, no traffic. Buy from the machines by the covered walkway; the ticket also covers the replacement bus if the line is out of service. From Centrale, Tuscany opens up: Florence in about an hour, Lucca in thirty minutes, Livorno and Viareggio in forty. Direct coaches skip the change entirely — Autostradale's Sky Bus to Florence at €15–20 in about 70 minutes, and to Lucca at €5–8 in 30 minutes, both from outside arrivals and cheaper booked online. For Pisa itself the LAM Rossa city bus costs under €3 and stops closer to the Leaning Tower than the PisaMover does, though it is slower. Validate regional train tickets before boarding; the fine is enforced.
Taxi scams & safety in Pisa
Pisa is a low-friction airport and the taxi fares are honest — €18–25 into the city on the meter, and around €170 to Florence, which is a real price for a real 85-kilometre journey rather than an opportunistic one. The genuine financial risk here is the ZTL. Florence's restricted zone is among the strictest in Italy, ringed with cameras, and a driver who enters without a permit passes the fine on to you months later through the rental company or the transfer operator. Confirm the drop-off point when booking rather than at the barrier, and give an exact address rather than a landmark. The same applies in miniature at Lucca, where private cars cannot enter the walls at all, and at Siena and San Gimignano, where cars stop at the gates and everything beyond is on foot. If you are heading to the Cinque Terre, do not hire a car: four of the five villages have effectively no parking and the roads down to them are single-track hairpins — park at La Spezia and take the local train in.
Getting from PSA to Viareggio
Viareggio is where Tuscany goes to the beach. Two and a half kilometres of promenade lined with Art Nouveau and Art Deco buildings, rows of numbered bathing establishments behind it, pine forest at the back and the Apuan Alps rising white with marble quarries in the distance. It is thirty kilometres from Pisa Airport and about forty minutes by train.
Getting there
PisaMover to Pisa Centrale for €6, then a northbound coastal train, fifteen to twenty minutes. Around ten euros total. Viareggio station is about fifteen minutes on foot from the seafront, which is manageable but longer than it looks with luggage on a July afternoon. A taxi from the airport runs €55 to €75.
How the beach actually works
Most of the sand is divided into concessions — bagni — with numbered rows of loungers and umbrellas, changing cabins, showers and a bar, hired by the day, the week or the season. This is the Italian system and it is not a rip-off; it is simply how the coast is organised. There are free public stretches, but fewer than in some regions.
The Liberty architecture
The promenade was rebuilt in the 1920s after a fire and the results are the reason to walk it — the Gran Caffè Margherita with its domes, the Bagno Balena, the Magazzini Duilio 48 with its floral ironwork. It is a coherent seafront from a specific moment, and much of it has been restored.
Carnival, in February
Viareggio's carnival is one of the largest in Italy: enormous mechanised floats, often politically pointed, paraded along the seafront over several weekends. The workshops that build them are in a purpose-built citadel on the edge of town and can be visited year-round, which is the more interesting visit of the two.
The Versilia coast, north and south
The same railway line runs up to Forte dei Marmi, which is the expensive end with designer shops and a very particular clientele, and down towards Torre del Lago. Between them the coast is continuous beach with different towns attached to different price points. Trains link the lot.
Puccini at Torre del Lago
He lived on the lake at Torre del Lago and wrote most of his operas there. The house is a museum and there is an open-air festival each summer performed beside the water, which is the reason a good many people come to this stretch of coast at all.
The marble mountains
The Apuan Alps behind the coast are quarried for Carrara marble and have been since Roman times — Michelangelo came here to select blocks. The quarries can be visited, and the sight of a mountain being taken apart is genuinely startling. It is forty minutes north by car and awkward by public transport.
Where a car helps
For the quarries, the hill towns behind the coast, and the Migliarino nature park with its dunes and pine woods. The coast itself is well served by trains and buses, so a car is for the hinterland rather than the beach. Seafront parking is metered and fills early in summer.
The season, and out of it
July and August the town is full and the promenade is a slow-moving evening crowd. June and September are warm, quieter and considerably cheaper. Out of season the bathing establishments close and Viareggio becomes an ordinary town of sixty thousand people with a very long empty beach, which has its own appeal.
Shelley, on this beach
He drowned off this coast in 1822 when his boat went down between Livorno and Lerici, and his body washed up near Viareggio and was cremated on the sand — Byron and Trelawny present. There is a monument. It is the kind of thing the promenade does not advertise and locals will tell you about.
Eating
The harbour end has the fish restaurants and the boats come in during the afternoon. Inland from the promenade the prices drop noticeably for the same food. The Tuscan coast does its seafood plainly, which is a compliment.
