리세르바 델레 세르바이에 에 델 파둘레 디 푸체키오 최고의 워킹 & 하이킹 경로

I had high hopes for this stretch. But I have to say I found it in terrible condition, and I'm very disappointed, because I could have promoted it on my tours and brought my clients there. I'm very disappointed that the much-hyped Via Francigena isn't kept in good condition. Just before Galleno, I also found a fallen tree that I had to climb over with my bike, and a second one is about to fall. After that? It's not much better.

Rest stop along the Via Francigena

Racing bike

A village center worth seeing, typical for the area

Ponte a Cappiano, Tuscany, is a charming place that takes its name from the historic Medici Bridge and Cappiano Hill. This picturesque town is located on the banks of the Usciana Canal, the outlet of the Padule di Fucecchio swamp, and at the foot of the Cerbaie Hills. The bridge of Ponte a Cappiano, which played a crucial role in the Via Francigena, an important medieval pilgrimage route, has a rich history dating back to the early Middle Ages. It was once administered by the Knights Hospitaller of Altopascio and was even studied by the famous artist and scientist Leonardo da Vinci. The current form of the bridge was built in the first half of the 16th century by Cosimo I de' Medici. Today, two inscriptions on the bridge still testify to this historic event.

The Cappiano bridge is the monumental bridge built substantially in this form in the mid-16th century on the initiative of Grand Duke Cosimo I, as documented by the marble epigraphs affixed to its brick structures. One of the two towers of the Medici bridge perhaps originally belonged to the fortified bridge of Cappiano that Leonardo drew in the famous map of the Arno valley RL 12685 from the Windsor Castle collection. In Leonardo's time, in fact, the Cappiano bridge still maintained the shape it had achieved a few centuries earlier, when the important crossing of the Francigena over the Usciana had been fortified, providing it with a tower. And it is precisely in the late thirteenth-century forms that Leonardo brought the future Medici bridge of Cappiano to paper.

There is a nice bench at the bridge and in the shade especially for pilgrims. We really enjoyed this break there.

And you can also eat really tasty food here. Lunch until 2 p.m.