In 24 hours I planned a week-long trip to Italy, covering three cities in seven days; hostels, flights, and activities were booked and researched for each city. One week was not nearly enough time in Italy, but a good last holiday before I started university the following week.
DAY 1
I unpacked and packed in the same day, having to do a quick wash before taking off for another hour long bus trip to the airport on the 17th of January directly after my trip to Dublin, Ireland. After a two hour flight I arrived outside the city center of Milan at the Milano Bergamo airport. While on the flight, an announcement was made that the stewardess's were selling tickets for ten euros to the city center on an hour long coach ride; perfect suggestion as I hadn't had enough time to research the distance and travel options from this point. Having arrived in the dark at the city center train and bus stop, I had to find my way to my hostel. This was a significant challenge as I didn't know about the metro or tram station the city provided, so I ended up taking a taxi cab to the hostel which did come to be much pricier than the city options and was proven to be significantly difficult as the driver did not speak a single word of English. To top off the struggle of traveling internationally, I was only able to take euro bills out of the ATM in the form of 50s. And the driver had little change; so did my hostel. After pulling up the calculator app on my iPhone and attempting to negotiate, I ended up just paying him a few euros more so I could get some even change and check into my hostel.
The hostel I stayed at, though reasonably priced was an interesting place to stay. Very different from the experience I had had in Ireland for one thing. I stayed at "Ostello Burigozzo 11" which was claimed to be near the city center, though it was at least a two mile journey to anything site-seeing worthy. I did a lot of walking in that city, getting lost for an average of four hours per each of the three days I was there. The hostel I stayed at was very tricky to find and the map we were provided with was unreadable to most extents. I tried to rely on strangers as I had often in Ireland but found that very, very few people spoke any English in this city, or most of Italy for that matter. The hostel was also not limited as a youth hostel and was mostly inhabited by Italian people often in their middle age or older. I did, however, meet a girl my first night there who is also an exchange student at my university in Nottingham, though she was just vising a friend from home in Milan for the one night.
That first night I decided I would try and go out as it was a Saturday night and I was told where about to find my way to the area that the students and youth apparently went on an evening out in that town. But it is so like me to never find where I intend to go until much later, and ended up lost, in high heels and nice dress, in a strange town, where no one speaks English, for two hours.
After wandering back and forth, up and down streets racking my memory in order to backtrack my steps, I tried to make the best of it and found a cute little "sandwich shop" where I could settle down and grab a bite to eat.
It was a little hole-in-the-wall shop but had the friendliest man and
after some time of me attempting to use my Spanish to translate, I was
able to place an order and ended up with the most amazing food I have
ever had. A thin, smoked meat and goat cheese "sandwich" with this
buttery crisp pita bread like crust. After walking down dozens of
streets to find my hostel, I finally made it home, cold and tired. But
just like Milan, that was not the last time I would get lost.
DAY 2
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| Pesto Pasta |
The next morning my
friend Alessandra came to visit as she lives about an hour away from the
city(she is a native Italian). That morning we were kicked out of our
rooms at 10:00am in which I ventured out for a few hours until she
arrived. Thankfully when she came I got to spend the day with someone
who was bilingual and it made my afternoon so much easier! We went to
lunch and she was able to help me order, then we went and tried to find
the Calivn Klein fashion show, as it was men's
fashion week the same time I was there :)
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| Nutella Crepe |
That part was unsuccessful,
but she did show me my way around the metro as well as my favorite place
I have seen so far; the Milano Cathedral Duomo.
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| Modeling those Louie V's |
We spent the rest of our time together catching up, window-shopping in
the strip mall with all the biggest names, and admiring the cathedral.
When we said our goodbye that evening I spent the rest of my night at
the cathedral and in Duomo
eating and appreciating its beauty.
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| Milan has so many pigeons! |
After getting lost for another two
hours on my way back to the hostel, I finally made it and was surprised
to find that from my room with 6 beds, I was the only one in it. That
night I went out into the hallway and met some really cool people
traveling from all over; Australia, Canada, Washington state, Puerto Rico. We all
chatted for a long while then headed to our rooms where I got a
good-nights rest!
DAY 3
I ventured out the next morning
for my last day in Milan with a lot of sight-seeing to do. Thanks to
Alessandra, I was able to find my way to the Van Gogh museum in the cathedral square. It was a really fascinating place to visit, even though they didn't have my favorite piece of his. But they did have over forty
pieces of his work from over the time of his artistic life spanning
from his experimentation with sketching to his masterful paintings as well as
paintings from his time in the mental hospital. I really enjoyed seeing
such an amazing piece of history as his art is all over 150 years old.
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| Cardinal Carlo Borromeo's resting place in the Milan Cathedral |
My
next mistake was revisiting the cathedral as I spent many hours there
that afternoon, just walking around and taking pictures of everything;
every intricate detail, I loved it there! I cannot describe to you how amazing this place
is unless you have visited it. The detail and effort put into every inch of
the cathedral was breathtaking. I even made the journey to the top of
the cathedral and was able to look over the city of Milan and appreciate
the cathedral and the city from above.
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| Lit a candle for loved ones |
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| Graffiti like this found all over Italy | | | | | | |
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| Cigarettes and smoking was seen abundantly in Italy |
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| Milan break-dancing baby |
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| Hot and thick chocolate and Nutella donut :) |
As the sky was
turning to dusk, I made my way (with the help of the nicest woman in
Italy- from the Cathedral) to find the Last Supper painting. The woman
at the cathedral gave me extremely specific instructions and I found the
church fairly easily. However, the museum hosting the art, like many
museums in Italy, were closed on that Monday and I was unable to see the
painting. I left disappointed and hopeful that I may have the
opportunity to see it again in the future.
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| Church site of The Last Supper |
After leaving the church where the painting lay unseeable for the day, I went back into Cadorna and sight saw for a bit.
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| Italy LOVES Nutella-- |
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I ended up finding a Gothic castle, which was surprisingly the sight for
the Biore men's fashion show of that evening. After many attempts to
bribe the workers and get on the guest list, I had to accept defeat and
was not admitted into the show :(
I made my way back to the cathedral square where I enjoyed some gelato and night photos before setting back for my hostel.
I took off at 5:00am the next morning for a train to Bologna where I would spend the next few days.
Keep coming back to see more about my time in Bologna and Venice!
xx DANA
The second day I spent trying to track down a popular med-spa I had read about in order to treat myself a bit and experience an Italian spa. But, on the way there I happened into a store/workshop of a local leather-worker and ended up spending my spa money there.....sorry dad. #SoWorthIt
