Today we visited the Grand Milan Cathedral (Duomo di Milano) and the third largest Gothic Cathedral in the World. It was very spectacular. This Cathedral was started in the year 1386 and over the next 5 centuries it was built and added too. At present the cathedral is continually being renovated and touched up. We are visiting in November so we were able to get our tickets for the Walking Roof Top Terrace and Inside the Cathedral, the day before we visited. We climbed 215 steps to reach the top and there we enjoyed spectacular views of the city and we were able to get closer to the statues that decorate this incredible building. As a side note, there are over 3400 statues carved into the facade and 135 gargoyles . It is just amazing. I suggest you watch the video linked, which shows us climbing the stairs, the roof and inside the cathedral.
We next visited the largest McDonalds I have ever been too. It also was the McDonald’s with the grandest vew facing the Duomo. A few interesting McDonalds menu items besides the the classic Amerian items were: breaded and fried olives, nutella on bread, and a McCafe area that served croissants.
Milan is know for their grand shopping and expensive stores at the Galleria of Vittorio Emanuele II. We went into this grand shopping area to see the bull made of tile mosaics and as tradition has it, if you spin three times on the bull you will have good luck. So we all took our turns doing that. We also stood and window shopped at the lavish shops: Louis Vuitton, Versace, Prada, Armani, Dolce&Gabbana and Gucci.
We walked a twenty minute walk to the Dominican Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie Church which is the church next to the dining hall of the monks which holds the Last Supper painting by Leonardo da Vinci. Wow it was incredible! These tickets were purchased a month ago, and I suggest that you buy these earlier yet. They are limiting the amount of visitors and all visiters have to go through a dehumidifier before entering the room that once was the dining hall for 100 monks at the time da Vinci painted this mural. I enjoyed learning about ways people are working to restore it and of all that people did to try and preserve this master piece. We learned about a sand bag wall that was made to preserve the dining hall that holds this masterpiece during WWII. When the war was over the roof was destroyed by a bomb and only the portion holding the painting survived.
We ended with some delicious gelato, which I think up to this point is my favorite Italian dessert.
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