Milan, Italy

Milannnno (no not the cookie!) what a great city! It is a hardworking, fashion-conscious, time-is-money city of 1.3 million people. It's a melting pot of people and history.  No doubt about it, Milan is Italy's fashion, industrial, banking TV, publishing and connection capital. After visiting Jordan and I agreed that if we were going to live in a major European city Milan would be at the top of our list. Read along and get all of our fun tips and tricks on what we saw and ate while in this awesome city!

We went to Milan on our trip to Lake Como with our Nona and Grandpa Larry. We drove to the outskirts and took the subway into the city center.  It definitely made me cringe watching Bode grab all the dirty hand rails, but thank goodness for hand sanitizer and baby wipes!

When we got off the subway at Piazza del Duomo we were no longer in quaint little Italian towns: hello metropolitan center! We were in the the big square in front of the cathedral and Galleria Vittorio Emanuele.   Crowded with people we got lured into feeding the birds

The Duomo is the centerpiece of the square and the symbol of the city, it is the fourth largest church in Europe and let me tell you it is pretty big!

The church has beautiful detail!

One of the most interesting sculptures in the church is this one of St. Bartolomeo, he was a first century apostle and martyr who who skinned alive by the Romans.  He is depicted here wearing his own skin like a robe. 

Bode enjoyed crawling around inside, and standing too!

On the other side of the Piazza is the gorgeous Galleria Vittorio Emanuele- the four story glass domed arcade built during the years right after Italian unification.  It was the first construction in Milan to have electric lighting and is filled with luxurious shops and cafes.

I seriously love the roof

On the ground they have a few mosaics, the most famous being a Torino (the city's symbol). For good luck, locals step on his irresistible little testicles and some say it works better if you spin-two times and it must be clockwise!

~Spin, Spin, Spin~

We went into one of Nona and my favorite stores.  Prada.  With such a fashionable place like this, it's no wonder Prada was founded in Milan.  We went to the first store, and oohed and ahhhed over lots of things we would like (a wallet, hint hint)!

We needed a snack before we could go on any further, so we went to a great find called Pomet.  The service here was top-notch.  When we walked in, they were passing out out appetizers and drinks (as many people say they do) and were very welcoming!

A pomet is a matured pizza dough stuffed with the yummiest of things! We were given a complimentary one to try, before we ordered one of every kind on their menu!

After feeling much satisfied in our bellies it was time to see the most remarkable, exactingly crafted fresco which is one of the ultimate pieces of the Renaissance: Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper.  Some good advice that I can offer is book your tickets ahead of time,  we had been eyeing this opportunity for months prior and even then tickets were sold out.  I wasn't going to take going to Milan and not seeing The Last Supper, so we paid a little more, and went on a Viator tour so that we could see the painting. 

The painting decorates the former dining hall of the Church of Santa Maria Delle Grazie.  The room depicted in the painting seems like an architectural extension of the church.  The disciples form an apse, with Jesus as the altar-in keeping with the Eucharist.  Jesus anticipates his sacrifice, his face sad, all-knowing and anticipating. I wonder if those who ate here in the 15th century thought that one day this would be one of the most famous art pieces in all of history?! 

 Along the adjacent wall:

It came very close to being destroyed during World War II. They protected the painting by stacking sandbags on both sides of the wall held up by scaffolding. The building took a direct hit from an Allied bomb, you can see the devastation below but miraculously the painting survived untouched.

The painting is behind the scaffolding. 

After seeing the Last Supper we got some AMAZING gelato at Chocolat.  If you go to Milan you should go here! This is our runner up to the gelato we had in Venice, and this stuff is so good!  Bode loved it!

He loves the chocolaT

That just about sums our our day trip to Milan.  But before we left we caught some awesome lighting in the Piazza del Duomo for some photos. 

<3

 These boys have my heart, and I love seeing them both enjoying travel as much as me!

 Droolin' wait for it....

Looks like dad got some new hair gel :)

 We took the train back out of town to our car.  Bode was zonking out, taking in all the fun memories and people watching.

"All that gelato...mmmm" he must be thinking

We had a great time in Milan, it's such a cool city and I feel like we only skimmed it.  There is so much to do and see there, we are already wanting to go back!