Lines

If you are ever so inclined to travel to a world famous tourist destination you will have to answer the question of lines.

What is the question of lines?

It is myriad questions in one:

1. How much of your vacation do you want to stand in line for?

2. Is the length of a line any indication of the quality of that which is at the end of it?

3. What commitments and reservations are you willing to make to avoid or lessen lines?

4. Are you willing to chance leaving and coming back in hopes of a shorter line?

5. Is exhaustive preparation worth it to learn secret end runs to avoid lines?

6. How much will you pay to avoid a line?


The answers to these question can define a great deal of one's trip to a place like Florence, but they are personal answers. What is right for one person is wrong for another. Nevertheless I believe there are some general truths to be found in the answers to the question of lines. And so in that spirit, fresh from a lovely trip with my wife to Florence and Rome, I will take my stab at answering the above, blurring the personal with what is generally true. It's a specialty of mine.


1. How much of your vacation do you want to stand in line for?

As little as possible, as much as necessary.

Lines are inevitable, starting with the very process of flying to Europe and all that the cruelties of modern airport travel bureaucracy entail. And these Disneylandish destinations (meaning no offense, though some offense is inevitable), like Florence, Paris, Rome or Venice, have an awful lot of things that an awful lot of people want to see or do or eat, all at once.


2. Is the length of a line any indication of the quality of that which is at the end of it?

Yes! And no. One might have to take one's lumps to stand in front of Botticelli's Primavera or The Mona Lisa, but really, if you open your eyes, they are beautiful, extraordinary pieces of art. However no one on earth is making a 6 euro sandwich in Florence that is worth an hour wait in a clogged street (Vinaio at lunchtime), especially when there are roughly four equally excellent panini shops in Florence that only rarely have lines (and ones easily avoided). In short, lines in great European cities almost always mean something really good, but they may or may not mean something inimitable. My Italian travel specialty is gelato and the biggest lines are not at the best gelaterias, even if they are at good gelaterias.

3. What commitments and reservations are you willing to make to avoid or lessen lines?

Us? Almost none. We don't like to be fenced in. And some of those reservations aren't as line-free as one hopes. But if one doesn't mind a bit of structure it can be worth it for something dramatic or essential to one.

4. Are you willing to chance leaving and coming back in hopes of a shorter line?

Yes. The great secret we learned for ourselves is to go to places for as long a time as possible, always better one city than three, advice no one I have ever advised has ever listened to. Oddly it turns out the more time you have to waste the less time you have to waste.

5. Is exhaustive preparation worth it to learn secret line end runs?

Yes, though it can take a lot of research. Ferreting out the secret of being able to buy an annual pass to the combined Uffizi and Pitti Palace and Boboli Gardens, something mentioned in no guide book I have read, produced serious joy and convenience and added some serious linelessness into our trip.

6. How much will you pay to avoid a line?

Not much. I like to squander all our money on swanky rooftop bars and exotic apartment rentals.