The Most Modern City of Italy...

...Milan.

Before we arrived in Milan, Italy we made a pit stop in Genova, Italy.  This was another quick stop, but this time it wasn't to see any sites...it was just so we could save mega-money on train fare.  We walked around for a bit, and then went to a local pub to have a few beers before our next train ride.  Hard to believe we started in Siena, then Pisa, then Genova....then to Milan.

I had only heard things about Milan and never really looked into pictures and whatnot so I was surprised to get off the train to see skyscrapers. When we got off the train from Pisa we noticed how big the train station was as well.  It looked like Grand Central in NYC. We found our hotel and grabbed a quick dinner as we were tired from all the train rides, and knew we would have another day of traveling tomorrow.

Doesn't look like Italy compared to our other Italian visits, does it?

We woke up early, and had a great breakfast.  We were pretty bummed to find out a few of the big attractions were closed on Mondays.  The castle and the building that held The Last Supper painting were closed.  Timing was not our friend.  We walked toward the city centre, and first stopped at the Sforza Castle just to take a few pictures of the exterior since we were unable to go inside.  Luck was on our side, as the castle was open and we were able to walk through it.  My favorite part was all of the stray cats that were in the moat area.  Now it is all grass...don't worry they weren't drowning.  I think at one point Jeff counted up to 8 cats, but I know there were more as we continued to walk inside/outside the castle. The cats made me laugh because in Siena I was telling Jeff about this staircase I went down that had cats all over it when I studied abroad.  I swore I saw one in another spot...I think Jeff just thought I was being a crazy-cat lady for a while. I was super excited to show him...there are actually stray cats in Italy! Inside the castle grounds was large and pretty although we didn't go inside to see rooms like we have in other castles.

 Entrance to the castle

 Inside of the castle

Just a few of the cats!

Next on our list was the Duomo di Milano (Milan Cathedral). Once again, only pictures from the exterior.  The inside was pretty, and pretty busy.  This was the only other experience we have had that you had to go through security to visit a church other than St. Peter's (The Vatican), which I found interesting. Afterwards we headed towards the shopping.  The Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II is one of the oldest shopping malls in the world.  It is four stories high, and filled with luxury retailers.  We obviously didn't buy anything during our time in the mall, but it was beautiful and very fancy.  We then headed to a street with more couture shopping. Again, no purchases.

 Beautiful cathedral in Milan's city centre

Last selfie of the trip

Inside the fancy shopping area. 

Our trip then was on its final leg of the journey.  We headed to buy our bus tickets, grab a quick lunch, and check out of the hotel. We traveled about an hour via bus to get to the airport, 1.5 hour flight home, and another 1 hour bus ride back to Nottingham all in a day's worth of traveling. We were happy to see Mackey, as I think he was happy to see us as well.  That is definitely the longest we have left him without anyone checking on him...made me a little nervous, but he did just fine!

Now we are back to our normal daily lives.  Jeff received a promotion at work a few weeks ago, so he has been working a lot more to get caught up from what he missed while we were away. I'm catching up on my graduate courses and making plans to see friends I haven't in a while. So everything is back to normal, and going just wonderfully!

Onto the next adventure...