Tuesday Tour of Milan

Today I took a tour of the major tourist sites in Milan. We visited the Duomo, the famous gothic cathedral that took over 300 years to build. Inside, there are many impressive things, including the floor – which is inlaid with 3 different colors of marble – black, white, and rose. I also saw an impressive statue of St. Bartholomew. He was skinned and the statue shows him holding his skin as a cloak.
After the Duomo, we walked to the Galleria, the shopping area and then we walked to the La Scala Opera House, stopping along the way to view the statue of Leonardo da Vinci and his 4 pages. The La Scala Opera House was beautiful. It’s known for it’s great acoustics. We got to go inside a theatre box to see what it would be like to see a performance there. There were no operas playing during the time we were in Milan, maybe someday we’ll be able to return and see one. The tour then took us to the Castello Sforzeco and we learned the story of the duke who lived there – he had 35 children and a lot of personal drama.

After the Castle, we went to see Leonardo’s famous fresco, The Last Supper. It was by far the most amazing fresco I’ve ever seen! It’s a miracle that it withstood the bombing in the 1940s. The fresco was painted in a room where the monks used to eat their meals. It was painted in a way that the monks felt as if they were eating at the table with Jesus during the last supper. The guide was very knowledgeable and pointed out things about the painting that I’d never noticed before.

After the tour ended, I decided to explore the Duomo area for the rest of the day. I climbed the stairs to the upper portion of the Duomo to get some shots of the exterior and all of the great statues and architecture. On my way up the very long, very narrow, stone staircase I got a little freaked out. It was very claustrophobic but eventually I reached the top!

I had a great view of the city from the top of the Duomo and spent a lot of time up there taking pictures. I then headed back down, had a nice lunch at a little pizza place, and then went back to the hotel. J was only working a ½ day so it was nice to spend the rest of the afternoon with him.