Attractions

Montecatini Terme

Montecatini is a quiet and ageing town that longs for its heyday as a "ville d'eau" where the very wealthy came to "take the waters." It is still a mecca for well-heeled seniors who like to do a bit of shopping to unwind after spending long hours drinking mineral-laden waters, getting radioactive vapors steamed into various parts of their body, and generally lying about doing nothing. This town's on permanent riposo, and its nucleus is the Parco dei Termi, a long park of neoclassical temples each expanding over the sources of various underground hot springs and vaporous crevices.

The oldest is Terme Tettuccio (tel. 0572-778-501), written of as early as 1370 and visited by the high-strung merchant of Prato, Francesco Datini, in 1401. The spa wasn't really exploited until Grand Duke Leopold I took an interest in developing the terme of the town in the 1700s. Reconstructed from 1919 to 1927, the long neoclassical facade opens onto the 20th-century ideal of a Roman bathhouse, decorated with murals, ceramics, and statues by Italy's Art Nouveau Liberty masters, like Galileo Chini and Ezio Giovannozzi. Drinking the waters here will supposedly do wonders for the liver you've been rotting with all that Chianti Classico.

The Terme Leopoldine (tel. 0572-778-551) at the park's entrance goes so far as to dedicate itself as a neoclassical (1926) temple to Asculapius, the god of health, as if its mineral mud baths could cure all ills. These and most of the other spas are open May through October only, but one remains open to the ailing, aching public year-round: the neo-Renaissance-meets-modernism house of the Excelsior (tel. 0572-778-509).

All the spas charge in the neighborhood of 4€ to 8.50€ ($5.20-$11) for half a day's entrance and water to sip and anywhere from 21€ to 104€ ($27-$135) for mud baths and more serious treatments, depending on season. Tickets are sold at the Società delle Terme office, Viale Verdi 41 (tel. 0572-7781 or 0572-778-487 for reservations; www.termemontecatini.it), outside the park entrance.

For a very light cultural workout to wring out your spa-sodden brain, you can drop by the Accademia d'Arte on Viale Diaz (no phone) during afternoons to see Macchiaioli and Liberty-style works by the likes of Giovanni Fattori and Galileo Chini as well as some Salvador Dalí surrealism and the piano on which Verdi composed Otello while taking the waters here. The hill sloping up behind the Parco delle Terme contains the wooded Parco della Panteraie, good for strolls through the woods and deer reserve, and a dip in the swimming pool.

Perhaps the most exciting part of the place for younger people is Montecatini Alto (tel. 0572-766-862; www.montecatini-alto.it) reachable in the summer via a funicular, which makes a 10-minute trip from Viale Diaz about every half-hour daily from 10am to 1pm and 3pm to midnight (in case all the relaxation has made the 5km/3-mile climb by foot daunting). It costs 3€ ($3.90) one-way and 5€ ($6.50) round-trip. For a bite to eat at night, be sure to stop by La Torre, Piazza Giusti 8 (tel. 0572-706-50; closed Tues), the most prestigious restaurant in town, built around a medieval tower. The Old Town offers a few other, less-interesting cafes and trattorie on its diminutive main piazza, but there are fine views across the Valdinevoli. Mostly, it's a pleasant break from the languorous wallet-draining hedonism and general flatness of the modern spa town below. It's also a base for short hikes into the surrounding valley, especially to visit the stalactites of the Grotta Maona caverns nearby (tel. 0572-74-581), open April through November Tuesday through Sunday from 9am to noon and 2:30 to 6:30pm. Admission is 4.50€ ($5.85) adults, 2.50€ ($3.25) for kids 6 to 12. The surrounding complex includes a bar that becomes a disco some evenings.

Monsummano Terme

One of the eeriest spas in Italy lies just south of Montecatini at Monsummano Terme. In 1849, the Giusti family discovered on their lands a series of stalactite- and stalagmite-laden caves with a sulfurous lake at the bottom and hot mineral-laden vapors permeating the air. By 1852, they had built a spa around it dubbed the Grotta Giusti Terme and converted their adjacent villa into a luxury hotel .

You don't have to stay at the inn to visit the spa at Via Grotta Giusti 171 (tel. 0572-90-771; fax 0572-907-7300; www.grottagiustispa.com), where you can don a white shift and a dun-colored robe -- like a member of some hedonistic monastic order -- and descend through a series of increasingly hot and steamily dripping caverns named, of course, Paradiso, Purgatorio, and Inferno, after Dante (the scalding sulfur pool below is the Lake of Limbo). It costs 40€ ($52) to steam in the caves for 1 hour, but you can also go in for a massive array of treatments (such as full-body massages, starting at 28€/$36 for 20 min. or 60€/$78 for a 50-min. Swedish massage; citrus aroma massage; mud baths; "thermal nasal irrigation"; and cellulite-reduction programs) or stay for a weeklong "cure." There are also full-day packages for massage and other treatments starting at around 170€ ($220). From April to the first weekend of November, the terme are open from 9am to noon (last entry 11am) and 3 to 6pm (last entry 5pm). The shuttle bus for the Hotel Grotta Giusti will take you here from the Montecatini train station free of charge.

The town of Monsummano Terme doesn't offer much more than the small 16th-century Santa Maria della Fontenuova on the main piazza, with a frescoed wraparound portico and a tiny museum (opened on request) containing some 17th-century paintings and an ivory crucifix reputedly by Giambologna. In front of the church is a statue of the town's only citizen of historical note, poet Giuseppe Giusti.

Follow the yellow signs for the steep, twisty road through groves of chestnuts, olives, and pines up to the old village of Monsummano Alto, all but abandoned since the population moved down to the valley in the 1500s. Founded in the Dark Ages, the village is mostly in ruins, but still intact are half a guard tower (the first thing you come to) and, down to the right of it, one of the crumbling town gates. A path of crushed gravel and grass slowly becomes stone as you arrive at the few houses and tiny church -- with an inexplicable small pine sprouting out halfway up the facade -- that huddle around the small piazza, surrounded by the junglelike ruins of the rest of town. Only three of the houses are continuing concerns, home to a handful of old residents, several loud dogs, and a dozen lazing cats. Beyond the church are some excavated 15th-century house foundations. The views of the surrounding valleys are excellent.