Milan in one day

I only had one day in Milan, so I had to make good use of it. My hosts had recommended me an itinerary and I planned to stick to it for the day. My first stop was the Church of St. Ambroglio, a very ancient chapel (from the 300-400) that has been aumented and restored many times during its history. I did not take many pictures as there was a Mass going on and I did not want to disturb the service.

The next place I visited was the Science Museum dedicated to Leonardo da Vinci, which was very interesting, but as most science museums, many of its areas are for kids and were not that interesting for me. I loved the Leonardo hall though, where they have an exhibition of many of his thought machines and instruments. The man was truly a genious.

I learned that his famous "Last Supper" mural is in one of the churches nearby. Very naively I thought of going there and pay a visit, but I was told that the tickets were fully booked for the next two weeks. Bummer. But maybe that was the reason my hosts did not include that stop in my itinerary, lol. I did take a few pictures from the Basilica of S. Maria della Grazie, it is a beautiful church.

From there I walked all the way to the Castello Sforzesco, Milan's magnificent fortress. The castel is mostly open in all its patios and spacious area, but if you want to come inside you must buy a ticket. It also has a few museums, but since I had already visited a museum one day, I remained outdoors. I also paid a little visit to Parco Sempione and took a little nap as I was tired of so much walking, lol.

After all this I was really hungry, so I walked down Via Dante and found many good -and expensive- ristorantes. I decided it was worth to give a try to one of them and I ordered a beef cut, as I was tired of so much pizza and pasta. The meat was good, but it can't be compared to a Texas steak, lol. Definitively beef is not the italian thing. Anyway, this meal refueled my energy and I kept walking until I got to the Duomo; the most magnificent construction I have ever seen. the Duomo is the third largest cathedral in the world, after St. Peter's in Rome and of St. Paul's in London. I took a chance to get inside and admire its wonderful paintings.

Then I decided to take a walk by the Gallery, the most sumptuous and luxorious open mall I have ever been to. You could see the stores of all the famous brands, including Prada. I felt a little ordinary wearing my football T-shirt in there, lol.

There was a giant screen by the Duomo because they were going to broadcast the Italy-Slovachia World Cup game. I still had a few hours to kill before the game, so I went to a McDonalds (only cheap restaurant in the area, lol) and I sat down by Via Dante again and listened to a very talented violinist.

My host Marco said he would join me for the game and so he did at 4:00 PM sharp. The weather was a bit uncomfortable there by the Duomo as the sun was shinning at its full and there were no shades. Slovachia scored and the mood was silent by the Duomo. My host said it would be better to watch the rest of the game at home and so we did. We suffered through the last minutes of it only to see Italy be eliminated from the World Cup. What a dissapointment!

Anyway, we did not have much time to lose as we would go and see fireworks in Monza... at least some celebration to forget the bitter taste of that World Cup day.