May 5 - Milan, La Spezia, and Pisa, Italy

MILAN
Duomo
The Duomo is a famous cathedral in Milan. One of the coolest aspects of the church is that you can go up to the roof and see the city from a different perspective, literally! I can't help but wonder what it would be like to call a cathedral like this your home church where you go for survive. The organ systems alone have to be incredible!

Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II
Located on the Piazza del Duomo, there's a shopping district full of brands I couldn't even imagine being able to justify purchasing. In addition, there are mosaics on the ground. One of them includes a bull, and it's said to be good luck to spin on bull's balls. Literally, I'm not making this up. Google it. Anyway, there's actually a divot in the ground where the bull's balls used to be. What an...interesting... tradition...

Santa Maria delle Grazie
Unfortunately tickets were all sold out for seeing the Last Supper for the afternoon, so I couldn't see it in person, but it can't be too much different from the pictures, right? I should probably start looking into sights and seeing which ones I should book tickets to in advance... The church was pretty though, and the priest was walking around chatting with visitors, so that was cool to see.

Overall, I wasn't too in love with Milan. It's kind of run down with a lot of what appears to be low income areas. The center is beautiful (which is usually the case with European cities). I'm sure if I had more time there and could have gone to the Milan Expo or had gone to Fashion Week, I would have seen much different sides of Milan. It was still cool to see though! Oh, and the delicious bottle sparkling wine for only €3 that I had all to myself was good too!

LA SPEZIA
Castello di San Giorgio
So this castle was closed when I got to it, but it was cool to just see from the outside. It's comical to me to have an old castle in the middle of a town. No matter how many old buildings I see, it still amazes me how much history there is in Europe compared to the US.

I didn't do a whole lot in La Spezia. It is a quaint little town though, and it was fun just to see that side of Italy. I did have an AMAZING Italian meal though, complete with a delicious, red Italian wine, bruschetta, lasagna with homemade sauce and noodles, and tirimusu that was definitely in the top 5 desserts I've ever had in my life! I definitely have fond memories of this town!

PISA
Leaning Tower of Pisa
This tower alone is beautifully made and a wonder to see. The fact that one side of it is more than a meter lower than the other is even more ridiculously amazing. I don't think any pictures can capture how much the tower actually leans. It's truly incredible.

Duomo Pisa and Battistero
The church and baptismal buildings are also beautifully constructed. I do not understand why there is a separate building for baptizing, but there it is!

Like La Spezia, there isn't a whole lot to see in Pisa, which is why I literally got in at night and left in the morning! It is a beautiful town though, and wouldn't be a bad place to live a more relaxed life away from the hustle and bustle. The only complaint I have is from the guy who snored louder than the cars passing by and sounded like he was going to die. I tried counting sheep, listening to music, even watching a movie; literally, I couldn't fall asleep until there was a period in the wee hours of the morning when he finally stopped snoring so fricken loud. I'm guessing by that point I was so sleep deprived that if he started back up again, I wouldn't have known!