Reservations - Sesto San Giovanni, Italy
Sesto San Giovanni, Italy
I woke up at 2AM with my iPod touch on my face, blog page opened and part way through a post. I managed to get back to sleep and woke up about 6 hours later. Karliana and I decided to let Jeff sleep in while we headed downstairs to get our complimentary breakfast! Nothing too fancy, but definitely not as impressive of a spread as the last place we stayed at. The good news is that they had espresso. Once Jeff had been awaken from his deep slumber, we all got ready to head into Milan for the day! We made it inside the Duomo, surprisingly free of charge! Our surprise only lasted a couple of seconds before we realized you have to pay for absolutely everything else. If you wanted to take pictures, you had to pay 2€ to get a wristband so that security wouldn't try and stop you from snapping some shots. If you wanted to go to the roof of the Duomo (which we did) you had to pay 12€ for the elevator and 7€ for the 250 steps. We opted for the stairs and definitely got our money's worth. Although the chamber-esque ascent to the top was sure to produce feelings of claustrophobia, the viewpoints from each level of the climb were spectacular. Seeing that much detail on each spire of the Duomo isn't something that can easily be put into words. We finally arrived at the very top of the Duomo and it was magnificent. I'm talking about some real eye-opening, life-loving beauty. Does that even make sense? I'm not so sure. After we had taken, to Jeff's dismay and disbelief, an impressive number of Selfies we just sat at the top and soaked up the sun that had finally decided to stay for the day! Such a glorious morning! The three of us walked from the Duomo, now looking for the Santa Maria Della Grazie which houses Da Vinci's "Last Supper" masterpiece. How cool is that? After passing by a stupid number of over-priced high end boutiques, we became lost (as per usual) and found a map on the back of a bus stop that would eventually light the way to our destination! The streets seemed to go on forever but we bumped into a couple from Pennsylvania who happened to be looking for the same place and walked behind them until we had made our way to the Santa Maria. Naturally, this was after I had tried to speak Italian to a non-Italian speaking tourist in the hopes that he would give us a hand - awkward. When we got there we were taken care of (or so to speak) by the woman at the front desk who informed us that it was something like 10€ to get inside and another 8€ to view "The Last Supper". I'm sure we would have sucked it up and paid the price, as a Da Vinci masterpiece of this spectrum is not something you see everyday, but HOLY COW! The lady at the desk didn't even look up from her books to tell us that we need to make a reservation to see the painting. How far in advanced do we need to make a reservation, you ask? 2-3 weeks. Wait, what? 2-3 WEEKS TO SEE A PAINTING THAT IS ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THIS THINLY PLASTERED WALL? If you think the amount of caps lock rage in this post is frightening, imagine the look on Jeff's face (aka The Shadow) when he hears the news. We thought yesterday's biscuit fiasco was bad, Jeff just about ripped off his shirt and punched through the wall head first; being mindful that the painting could very well be directly on the other side. Just kidding. Sorry Jeff hehe. But we had walked so far and for so long to see this incredible piece of history. Tough luck! It only seemed right that we would immediately take the metro home, run to the nearest grocery store and load up on all the cheap liquor we could carry. We seriously stayed in our room the rest of the night, eating bread and grapes and drinking wine and limoncello. The alcohol consumption was maintained throughout the night and our attempts to plan a trip for tomorrow became incredibly difficult to focus on. I knew I was sharing a room with a future doctor and soon-to-be nurse as we had a random 10 minute session of checking each other's pulses. The good news is, we are all still alive. Although we didn't do much today, the conversations we had together were the best part. BONTOBLOGGING: check yourself before you wreck yourself.