Autobahnanza

Milan Parte Due

(NOTE: Sorry for the double Milan posting. We had some trouble posting it and thought that it didn't actually make it up on to the blog. As such, I wrote up this piece on Milan. It's basically a repeat of what I already said, but with more dumb jokes. Enjoy.)

I'm currently acting as passenger on our last official driving day in Europe. Nat is headed from Garmisch-Partenkirchen to the castle Neuschwanstein. It seems to be the perfect opportunity for me to blather on about our day in Milan.

About a month ago, we made reservations to see DaVinci's "La Ultima Cena" (last supper) fresco on Tuesday the 12th, thus this was the appointed "visit Milan" day. More than one guidebook recommended against driving in Milan proper, so we decided to try to drive to a train station, park, and take the public transit into the city. How did we fare you say? Step 1 was a failure. Using low-detail, incomplete maps (a theme for our trip), we couldn't find the station. We did find a clean, well-lit, and free garage near a shopping area on the northern outskirts of town. We left the car there and set out on foot. More than an hour and 4 or 5 miles later, we found a metro stop and took it to the center of the old city - the Milan Duomo.

The façade of the very impressive Duomo is currently entirely covered in scaffolding. (To save money, we contemplated sleeping on said scaffolding but in the end, creature comforts won out). Since our legs were tired from our long walk, and there was surely more walking to be done, we decided against climbing the many stairs to the top of the Duomo. Instead, we checked out the nearby "shopping mall". I think your city is bound to have a shopping addiction when families named Gucci, Prada, Oldnavy, and Armani are natives.

After lots of window-shopping, we made our way to the greatest culinary store I have ever seen. It is called Peck, and it is simply amazing. Olive oils, meats, cheeses, gelato, wine, sausage, meats, cheeses, breads, spices, meats, produce, herbs, meats, and everything you can imagine! Unbelievable. The Peck folks also have a number of restaurants in the area, most notably one called Cracco-Peck. I would have loved to have eaten there, but a full meal con vino would have cost about as much as our car. We had lunch in a lower-scale Peck eatery and had some very nice sandwiches, and of course, wine. The great thing about Italy is that good mozzarella cheese is as common a sight as people wearing ties at UVA football games. Thankfully UVA fans don't come with every sandwich you order in Italy.

We explored a few other areas of town by subway and by foot, but overall, Milan is just a city not unlike any large U.S. city (save for the Vespas and older looking architecture). The La Scala Opera house was interesting, as was the bohemian Navigli district, but it just doesn't have the charm of Venice, or the natural beauty of Como. The one part of Milan that just blew us away was the aforementioned fresco by Leonardo. Due to the material of the wall itself, this painting has been fading almost since the day it was completed. The painting is on a wall of an old monastery, and it actually seems to interact with the room. The painting itself looks like a continuation of the room making it seem as if the last supper were happening in the same room in which the monks would take their meals. The right half of the painting appears to have natural light coming in from the left half of the room. There are actually windows on the left wall of the room. This famous painting was one of the most impressive things we've seen on this trip.

Anyway, we somehow navigated our way back to our car without a map and drove back to the lake where it was raining. We picked the right day to do Milan. See you! (Oh, I think Peck has a website. Check it out if you like food. Did I mention they sell meat?)

posted by Chris @ 8:50 AM