Urbino sits on the top of two hills and has not one level street: you are always climbing, and that is the first thing to know before parking. What you climb to see is the Palazzo Ducale, which Federico da Montefeltro had built in the middle of the fifteenth century and which looks nothing like a castle: it is a city inside the city, with the courtyard of honour, the inlaid studiolo the size of a cupboard, and the two little towers you see from the whole valley. Inside is the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche, and inside the gallery is Piero della Francesca's Flagellation, which hangs in one room and is worth the journey on its own. Raphael was born here, and the house where he was born can be visited. The old town has been a UNESCO site since 1998, and it is one of the rare places where the Renaissance city is not a quarter but the whole town.
Sleeping
Stops and overnight stays
Urbino sits on the top of two hills and the centre is closed to traffic: the choice is between sleeping below and climbing, or squeezing into a car park on the edge.
Area sosta camper di via Pablo Neruda
via Pablo Neruda, 61029 Urbino (PU)
a free municipal area with a service point, drinking water and grey and black waste disposal. It is the one where we stayed. It sits barely two kilometres below the centre, and you go up into town in two ways: by bus, whose stop is right there, or on foot in twenty or twenty five minutes, all of it uphill. OpenStreetMap marks the waste drain a little further on, at 43.733614, 12.626895.
it is the car park attached to Porta Valbona, that is to the way into the old town: two hundred metres and you are inside, with no climbing at all. But the bays are of ordinary size and the manoeuvring is tight, so it works for a compact vehicle, under five or six metres, and not for a long one. No services.
services not recorded
Paying, about 10 to 18 euros for twenty four hours
Urbino is all uphill, and the streets of the centre are narrow and steep: you cannot take the vehicle in
The motorhome is left below: at the area on via Pablo Neruda, free and with a service point, and you go up by bus or on foot in twenty to twenty five minutes of climbing. Anyone with a short vehicle can instead go into Piazza Mercatale, two hundred metres from Porta Valbona
From the Palazzo Ducale to Raphael's house is three hundred metres, but uphill
The Fortezza Albornoz stands on the hill facing the palace, and is the point from which the whole town is photographed
Seeing
Sights
The palace is the day. The rest sits around it, within four hundred metres, and all of it either up or down. Tap a marker on the map to open its entry below.
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Palazzo Ducale and Galleria Nazionale delle Marche
Museum · paid entry · 43.72420, 12.63615
open Tuesday to Sunday 8:30 to 19:15, with the ticket office closing at 18:15, and closed on Mondays except for the special afternoon openings, 15:00 to 19:00, which in 2026 run in June, July, August and September. Free under 18 and on the first Sunday of the month. Inside are Piero della Francesca's Flagellation, Raphael's Mute Woman and the panel of the Ideal City; Federico's studiolo, entirely in wood inlay, is the smallest room and the most remembered.
10 euros, 2 euros for European citizens between 18 and 25
the house where Raphael was born in 1483 and where his father Giovanni Santi had his workshop. From March to October it opens Monday to Saturday 9:00 to 13:00 and 15:00 to 19:00, Sundays and holidays 10:00 to 13:00 and 15:00 to 18:00; from November to February it does 9:00 to 14:00 on weekdays and keeps the holiday hours on Sunday. Last entry half an hour before closing, shut on 25 December and 1 January. The ticket price is not stated on the website: to be checked on the spot.
it stands next to the Palazzo Ducale, on the same square. The neoclassical front is nineteenth century, because the earlier cathedral came down in the earthquake of 1789.
on the facing hill, inside the parco della Resistenza. You do not go for the fortress but for what you see from there: the palace with its two little towers and the roofs of the town, which is the view everybody knows.
it stands in front of the Palazzo Ducale, on the square. The Renaissance marble doorway is of 1451, and the lunette above it is a copy: Luca della Robbia's terracotta original is inside the palace.
courses and concerts of early music in the churches and courtyards of the centre, with students arriving from half of Europe. Programme on the FIMA website.
This year's dates are not out yet
Festa dell'Aquilone
first Sunday in September
the ten quarters of Urbino compete to build the finest kite and fly it highest, on the slopes of the Cesane outside town. It has been done since 1955, the real contest is on the Sunday and the days before are spent preparing in the streets: it is a town festival and not an event, and you can tell by who runs it.
Festa del Duca
mid August
four days of Renaissance re-enactment in the old town, with costumed processions, flag throwers and courts modelled on Federico's. It has been going since 1982, and a town closed to traffic helps a great deal.
Remember
Useful tips
On Mondays the Palazzo Ducale is closed, and without the palace Urbino is half a town. If your day falls on a Monday, check first whether the special afternoon opening applies: in 2026 it runs from June to September, 15:00 to 19:00
Half a day is enough for the palace, but the gallery is large: anyone who looks at everything takes twice as long
You are always climbing. With children, or with knees in disorder, the round of the centre makes itself felt
The motorhome is left on via Pablo Neruda and you go up: the bus leaves from right there, and on foot it is twenty to twenty five minutes of climbing. Piazza Mercatale is very close to the gate, but the bays are of ordinary size and the manoeuvring is tight
Distances and times by road, measured with OSRM on OpenStreetMap data.
Looking
Urbino in photographs
9 shots from our visit. Tap one to see it large.
the two little towers seen from below at dusk, with the lit loggia between them and palms in front of the brick wallthe courtyard of honour framed from under an arch, with the Latin inscription running round all four sides and naming Federico duke of Urbinothe gilded coffered ceiling with its blue rosettes, and below it the painted panels hung all around the roomthe marble statue on its plinth in front of the brick front of the palace, with the windows lit and the friezes repeating FE DVXthe cathedral with its black dome and pale stone front, at dawn, with the cobbled square empty in front of itthe marble statue of a pope in cope and tiara, set against the brick wall, with its sharp shadow beside itthe street running down between the houses, with red flags hung from the walls and boys going down carrying a yellow kitethe town seen from outside the walls, with the bell tower and the cathedral dome among the roofs and the hills behindone of the little towers close up, with its conical tiled roof, and on the hill opposite the Fortezza Albornoz
