Reluctantly, we left Nice on the afternoon of April 12 and pulled into Milan later that evening. We passed by Monte Carlo and mournfully caught glimpses of it...
So we stayed at a somewhat unfortunate hotel named America Hotel, but the owner did not speak very good English. He also had an attitude. Meh.
The following morning, in no rush to wake up or anything, we did some sightseeing. I wasn't expecting to have a blast in Milan since it's just a bunch of really expensive designer clothing stores with not much else. But hey, when in
Rome Milan, though this does not mean I actually bought anything. Though I probably got a tan. Ugh.
Milan Cathedral (
Duomo di Milano). Not much to remark except we saw a bust in the square in front of it -- some cops came in and arrested one of many guys for selling imitation goods, complete with pinning the guy down on the pavement and such. The other guys escaped. Ehhhh....
Ray-Ban headquarters overlooking the Cathedral square? Yea this place was ridiculous but it gets better...
Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, the most swank shopping arcade I've ever been in. Didn't even bother window shopping -- it would've been too painful to look at the prices but mostly irrelevant since I'm not crazy about designer clothing.
Came across an intersection in the shopping arcade. On one corner, we have Louis Vuitton...
Another corner we have Prada...
Finally we have... McDonalds?! Though to be fair, it looked pretty pimpshit too. I wonder if the burger patties are finely stitched and made from real Italian leather. I somehow doubt it though.
Leaving the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, we come across a small piazza with a statue of Leonardo da Vinci! #nerdout
Jess and I continued to walk around Milan while the guys went back to the hostel to take care of some business. Here's me in front of the Armani megastore, just to rub it in my designer-obsessed cousin. Though the store wasn't open because it was Easter Monday. Oh well.
Jess and I would come to realize that most of the designer boutiques were closed, except for the "discount" outlet store (stuff was still above our price range. I think shoes were going for a "heavily reduced" price of €200. eff that.). The "affordable" clothing stores were open though, like H&M and Zara.
By late afternoon, we were out of things to do in Milan so we just ate gelatos. Then we hopped on a tram for shits and giggles (with valid tram tickets. Thank god we bought them because there was a spot check and a guy got pulled pulled off the tram.). We did come across a landmark that was on the postcards we bought so we hopped off the tram...
Sforza Castle (
Castello Sforzesco). Formerly a castle, today it's a set of small history and art museums.
After this we decided it was time for dinner. We each ate pizza or pasta, since we're in Italy and all that. After we finished, we thought the wait staff would give us our bill but this was not the case. We sat around for about 20 minutes then we realized we were supposed to be socializing. Kept forgetting that, as Americans who inhale our meals and rush off to the next thing. So we sat around a bit and talked about movies and books. We also continued the game that Dan and John had been playing since Paris -- asking everyone a personal question, anywhere from "What's your favorite Sufjan Stevens song?" to "Who was your first kiss?". Sitting around after dinner and socializing ended up being a lot of fun.
The next morning we headed to Venice! It was absolutely beautiful!
I was sitting across from an American tourist family on the train to Venice. They had a Venice tour book so I borrowed it from them for the ride to read up on stuff to do. Venice isn't in great shape. The native population size is decreasing and the average age of its residents has been increasing. Oh yea there are occasional floods and stuff too.
The tour book described Venice as a "floating museum" because the people there are overwhelmingly tourists just walking around admiring the streets and canals of Venice as if they were works of art. Walking around the narrow storybook-esque and mazelike streets (hairier than old London, so hairy that we splurged to get a map even though the whole place was like less than 1 square mile). Lots of pigeons here, and lots of unwitting tourists feeding them. Sigh.
Even the floating museum had a McDonald's, tucked away like the embarrassing half-brother with 3 arms and named "Hamburger."
The obligatory gondolas-in-canal shot:
I love how the colors of the buildings are reflected in the water. This is the Grand Canal (
Canal Grande), the the largest canal and one that circles Venice.
We had pizza again for dinner. Excellent! I had a slice of mushroom + sausage (the thin crust one in in the second row that's still whole) and spinach+tomato+feta(?) (the deep dish one in the lower left). Definitely better than the pizza in the US but anyone could've guessed that.
After dinner we walked around Venice at night.
Carnival of Venice (Carnevale di Venezia) is a big holiday. It's essentially a giant masquerade party. There were lots of places selling beautifully detailed masks, legit and of the souvenir variety. It would've been awesome to be in Venice for it, but sadly it takes place from around 2 weeks before Ash Wednesday and ends on Mardi Gras.
A really awesome chess set!
We were only in Venice for one night, regrettably. I would've liked to stay there at least another night because the surrounding islands look like a lot of fun too, like San Giorgio Maggiore (the island in the background of the first Venice photo). Alas, next time!
The next day, we headed to Florence. I did a book report-ish project involving Italy back in 6th grade and one of the two cities I chose to research in depth was Florence. All I remember about Florence was the Old Bridge (
Ponte Vecchio).
And here it is, in the flesh...
Ponte Vecchio is unique in that, as you can see, there are houses and shops on it. Most of the shops were made-to-take-advantage-of-tourists jewelry shops though. There was an open space on the bridge (center of the bridge) for people to admire the Arno river and for street musicians to perform.
Michaelangelo's David is in a museum in Florence so we decided to wander around in that general direction. After getting off the
Ponte Vecchio, we walked through Uffizi and into Piazza della Signoria, a large square filled with giant statues, including a replica of David!
Also in this square is The Fountain of Neptune. I was expecting a more spectacular display of spewing water.
The Florence Cathedral (
Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore). It's got a cardboard model look to it, and I also wasn't used to seeing patterns painted onto a church.
First sighting of Duff beer in a bar near the Florence Cathedral. It was €5 per bottle so we passed, for the time being. The bartender told us it's a Belgian beer. Intriguing...
Florence is in the Tuscany region of Italy. Buildings are simple and follow a boxy format with minimal frills. They are also warmly colored -- light coral and pale yellow were common colors. And when the setting sun hits them, they look really homely and traditional.
We eventually got to the Accademia museum, the one that houses Michaelangelo's David, but after one glance at the line and the admission fee, we decided to pass and that the replica we saw earlier was good enough. By this point in the trip, we were pretty jaded, museum-wise. Also, pretty tired.
So we went back the way we came. Here's the Uffizi courtyard again with the Arno river in the background.
There are statues in the courtyard of the Uffizi. Here's Macchiavelli. Even the statue depicts him as a weasel.
Amerigo Vespucci. Without him, America might be named something different.
The author of the Pinocchio story is from Florence so there were Pinocchio souvenirs on sale. Here's the inside of "the original Pinocchio store." The shop lady yelled at me for taking a picture, though, since it was forbidden.
We wandered a bit and took a break at the Pitti Palace (
Palazzo Pitti). Unfortunately it was closed. I really wanted to go in and take a look at the Boboli Gardens. This was also the palace where the Medici family lived, a name that I vaguely remember from learning about the Renaissance in middle school. This is the facade of the palace -- looks very flat and ordinary, along the same lines as the Florence Cathedral. Things really are simple in Florence.
Afterwards we grabbed dinner in a restaurant serving made-for-tourists food, then we tried searching for Duff beer at a more reasonable price but to no avail. We headed back to
Ponte Vecchio to chill.
To our delight there was a really talented street musician who did a great cover of Eagle-Eye Cherry's "Save Tonight." Chilling on the
Ponte Vecchio was like chilling in a coffee shop, but outdoors and with a beautiful river to admire.
Ciao, Firenze!
