Where to begin.....Where to begin? I guess I will begin with why we went to Italy in the first place. Back in January, I turned 30 and Adam decided to take me somewhere that I had always wanted to go. Switzerland was the place, but because of expenses, he decided to take me to Milan, Italy and then to Switzerland for a day by train. (Wasn't that the sweetest thing in the world?) Also because of expense, we waited until now to take the trip.
Adam, Emily, and I left on Tuesday afternoon on a plane from Athens headed for Milan, Italy. We arrived in Milan as it was starting to get dark, so we grabbed a taxi to our Hotel. As we drove along we, our hopes began to sink lower and lower as the cab fare rose higher and higher. When we pulled into our hotel, the fare peaked at 88 euros (which is over $100). This was not a great beginning to our trip and on top of that, it was starting to rain. We talked to the hotel guy and he assured us that that was normal fare from the airport, and we realized very quickly that if we didn't find another way back to the airport, that we were going to be out of money before we got started.
The next morning we awoke to rain, rain, and more rain!!! We got up and decided to go down town anyway. We went down to breakfast and our spirits rose a bit. They had a cappuccino machine!!!!! After we had feasted on croissants and cappuccino, we got our coats and umbrellas and headed out to the metro that took us downtown. Emily thought this was great fun and she even held her own umbrella.
In the Center we just spent some time walking around and getting our bearings. We found our way to the Duomo, which is the second largest cathedral in the world. It was really neat to see. We were also able to see the home stores of Prada, Louis Vitton, and Gucci. It was pretty interesting. Emily was getting mad with the rain and she kept seeing us pass "golden arches" and all that she was interested in was "Fry fries". We got her some of course and then walked around some more and then went back to the room to dry out. We rested and then ended our evening by going to a restaurant by the hotel for pizza and spaghetti. It was WONDERFUL. We ended up eating there every day.
The next morning we woke up to beautiful weather and we went back downtown and toured the DaVinci museum. We were able to see some of his sketch books which was really neat. After lunch, we went to visit DaVinci's "The Last Supper." That was really cool. We really enjoyed that. They only allow 25 people every hour and we had made reservations in advance online. We were in a group of Japanese tourist. It was pretty funny. They liked making faces at Emily, and she liked laughing at them.
On Friday we boarded a train and went to Lugano, Switzerland. The weather was beautiful and so was the scenery. Lugano is situated on a beautiful lake and we spent the day walking the streets, feeding the ducks on the lake, and playing in the parks. We all decided that this was the best day of the whole trip.
Now we are back at home and getting things ready for a group of pastors that are coming to visit us next week. We are excited about it, but we still have so much to do before they come, so I better get to work. Thank you all for sharing our adventures with us. Hope you enjoy!
Brandie
