La Giunchiglia

Walking tours of Lucca

La Giunchiglia came into being in Lucca in the early 1980s. It was set up by a group of young art history students who simply loved their home town and wanted to devote their future and make a career out of making its history and art better known organizing Walking tours of Lucca.

Lucca was scarcely known on the tourist track at that time and opportunities for having the pleasure of showing it to visitors were few, so many of us were soon forced to turn to other cultural activities and ended up acting as tour guides as a hobby.

In the 1990s the Lucca guides company was acting on a number of different fronts in the desperate hope of surviving. Some of the founder members gave in and left to become teachers. Others, including ourselves, who were more stubborn or maybe more idealistic, decided to continue and keep on investing energy in our original purpose, convinced it would eventually be worth it.

We increased our knowledge of Lucca and the surrounding area by going to different courses and finding out more and more about our history, art, archaeology, botany, traditions and the things that are produced here, such as wine and extra virgin olive oil. We tried to focus on everything that would enhance the quality of our tours, and to promote Lucca through the Web.

It took us a while but now, looking back over those years of volunteering, we’re very proud of what we “gave”. It all comes back to us every single time our clients (from all over the world) tell us how charming and unique our town is and how they appreciate our introduction to it, showing them its treasures and telling them its secrets.

A passion that became the best job we could possibly have in our beloved city. We want to share that passion with everyone who comes to visit us in Lucca.