Milan - May 21, 2014

This is a photo of Milan's duomo. It was taken by me two years ago. The weather today was similar. So was the crowd. I am getting ahead of myself.

Ann and I had the buffet breakfast in the tiny room in the basement of our hotel. No eggs, but plenty of corn flakes, bread and coffee. After our meal we set off on our tour. We decided to get one-day metro passes and follow a tour that I downloaded onto my iPhone. Metro took us under the city from the central train station to a station at the duomo. We went inside and saw the beautiful stained glass windows, some crypts, several crusifixes, huge pillars and all of the other things that are normal in a Catholic cathedral. To take photos, a permit is required. I chuckled at the poor church girl who had to keep telling Japanese tourists to stop taking photos. The language barrier was frustrating for her.

The next site that we saw was the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, the first shopping mall in the world. Then we walked to La Scala. Our first museum was Poldi Pezzoli where we looked at Northern Italian and Netherlands/Flemish paintings as well as collections of decorative art including textile, porcelain, glasses, jewelry and metal works. These items were collected by the Pezzoli family who Ann claimed had too much money.

We then strolled along a couple of narrow streets which were lined by fashion shops. We could have been outfitted in clothes and shoes which would have cost a lot more than what we paid for our trip. Speaking of fashion, I have seen lots of Italian businessmen dressed in dark brown patterned suit jackets with jeans that look like they were worn while weeding the garden. Is this fashion?

We found the huge public garden (park) where we stopped for panini and to watch the dogs playing in the dog park.

Walking on, we found our way to the Pinacoteca di Brera. This is another famous art museum. I was getting a little tired of going to art museums especially ones with 40 rooms. So I was relieved when the ticket office was closed for a couple of hours because of a labor meeting. Instead, we walked into the first floor of the building which is the university of art. Ann spotted a sign for the library so we walked up the stairs and saw several beautiful dark paneled rooms with hundreds of old books on the shelves. One room was partially dedicated to an old-fashioned card catalog. I liked this better than the museum.

Our next stroll was down a street with several enticing restaurants. We ended our walk at Castello Sforzesxo. With tired legs and bruised feet (lots of cobble stones) we got on Metro and rode back to the hotel.

We interrupted our afternoon downtime by getting some gelato at a highly rates gelateria next to the train station. My licorice and creme was really good. Ann said that her hazelnut and coconut was also good. We learned that this gelateria makes its own gelato. The ice cream has strong rich flavors.

Dinner tonight was at Trattoria Corso which is located in the old part of town near the castle. We took Metro. Our dinner started with burrata which is a cheese much like mozzarella - hard on the outside and soft in the inside. It had a warm tomato sauce. Ann had beef with rosemary and a balsamic vinegar reduction. I had pork loin with a strawberry sauce which included fresh strawberries. Our portions were huge but the meat was a little over cooked. When we paid our bill, we had complimentary shots of limoncello, grappa or a berry cordial from Sardinia.

After a short walk to settle our meal, we took Metro back to the hotel.