Masaccio’s Trinity, Ghirlandaio’s frescoes and Paolo Uccello’s Green Cloister: what to see at Santa Maria Novella, with opening hours and visiting rules.
The tombs of Michelangelo and Galileo, Giotto’s fresco cycles and Cimabue’s Crucifix: what to see in the basilica of Santa Croce, with current hours and prices.
Michelangelo’s New Sacristy, the mausoleum in semiprecious stone and the secret room: what to see at the Medici Chapels in Florence, with tickets and hours.
The museum of Florentine sculpture, from Donatello’s David to Michelangelo’s Bacchus: eight works to look for at the Bargello, with current hours and tickets.
The painting is not a birth, the pose comes from a statue and the winds from an ancient gem: Botticelli’s Birth of Venus explained, at the Uffizi in Florence.
The Ponte Vecchio in Florence: why it has shops on it, how it survived 1944 and how to walk the reopened Vasari Corridor above it today.
Pitti Palace and the Boboli Garden in Florence: the palace’s five museums, the Palatine Gallery, what to look for in Boboli and the updated ticket prices.
Michelangelo’s David at the Accademia Gallery in Florence: the story of the rejected block, the Prisoners, updated prices and how to book your slot.
How to visit the Florence Duomo: the three passes compared, the climb up Brunelleschi’s dome with its compulsory slot, and checked prices and times.
Who the nine figures are, why the painting reads from right to left and what hides in the flowered meadow: Botticelli’s Primavera explained at the Uffizi.
All of Bernini’s fountains in Rome, from the Barcaccia to the Four Rivers: which are really his, what to look at in each one and the walking route.
Bernini’s Bee Fountain in Piazza Barberini: the wrong inscription that foretold the pope’s death, and why what you see today is a reconstruction.
The Barcaccia Fountain in Piazza di Spagna: why it sits below street level, who really carved it and what remains of the 2015 damage. History and visit.
Bernini’s Fountain of the Four Rivers in Piazza Navona: who the four statues are, where the obelisk came from and why the veiled Nile legend is false.
A two-day itinerary in Florence, from the Duomo to the Uffizi and Pitti Palace, with checked ticket prices and the bookings you need to make in advance.
From Botticelli’s Primavera to Caravaggio’s Medusa: ten works to look for at the Uffizi, with the room numbers updated after the museum renumbered them.
A guide to the Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris: Monet’s two oval Water Lilies rooms, the Modiglianis, Renoirs, Picassos and Matisses, with hours and tickets.
Saintes has a Roman arch of AD 18 saved by Victor Hugo, an amphitheatre among the oldest in the empire and a cathedral with a truncated bell tower.
Jumièges Abbey was sold as a stone quarry after the Revolution and saved in 1852. It stands roofless today, and anyone under 26 gets in free.
The Seu Vella of Lleida has its cloister in front of the church rather than beside it, and it was an army barracks from 1707 to 1948. The walls still show it.
Tarragona Cathedral holds Pere Johan’s alabaster altarpiece, the largest Romanesque cloister in Catalonia and an Arabic inscription dated to the year 960.
The Pont du Gard is the tallest stretch of a fifty-kilometre aqueduct that fell only centimetres per kilometre. Walking in to see it costs nothing at all.
The Sagrada Família in Barcelona is read through the colour of its light: blues and greens to the east, reds to the west. Since June 2026 the tallest church.
Zaragoza is the only city in the world with two working cathedrals: La Seo, with its Gothic alabaster altarpiece, and El Pilar, with its Goya domes.
The Aljafería Palace in Zaragoza holds the only 11th-century taifa royal seat still standing, a ceiling dated 1492 and the cells of the Inquisition.
What to see in Collioure: the castle of the kings of Majorca, the bell tower that began as a lighthouse, the frames along the seafront and the Fauvism trail.
What to see in Nîmes: the Maison Carrée, the Arena, the Tour Magne and the Musée de la Romanité are minutes apart on foot, and the right pass saves seven euros.
The Arena of Nîmes is the best preserved Roman amphitheatre: what to look at inside, the centuries it spent as a walled neighbourhood and 2026 prices.
What to see in Carcassonne: the lices between the two walls and the basilica of Saint-Nazaire are free, and the ticket only covers the castle and the ramparts.
Twelve places to see in France outside Paris, grouped by area and reachable by train, with the real journey times and the two that have no station.
Nine villages in Lazio to visit, with what makes each one different from the others, verified ticket prices and how to get there without a car.
The artworks to see in Paris choosing the ones you can actually look at: stained glass, an enormous Veronese, free museums and the necropolis of kings.
The 8 museums in Rome not to miss, with one emblematic work each, the closing day, the price and the rule for the free first Sunday of the month.
A 3-day Rome itinerary built around the compulsory bookings and the weekly closures, with transport, the Roma Pass and verified opening hours.
The works to see at the National Roman Museum: the Boxer at Rest, Livia’s painted garden, the Discobolus Hitler bought, the Ludovisi Gaul.
The works to see at the Doria Pamphilj Gallery: Velázquez’s Innocent X, Bernini’s bust, two Caravaggios, the Raphael and the Hall of Mirrors.
