Gelato in the Rain

I thought this title post up while walking in the rain, with my umbrella in my right hand, and a huge scoop of gelato in my left. I felt it was a beautiful phrase and incoporated everything I loved about Italy. The rain, and the gelato.
Ok, maybe that isn't ALL that I love about Italy but it is two of my favorite things.
This weekend we went to Milan!! We being Emma, Lee, Alan, and Alex. We were five Aggies setting out to explore an unknown land!! Luckily we had a guide, or we would have failed miserably, how about I just start with Friday and let the story unfold on its own!!

OK! So Friday (May 30th) all five of us met at the train station in Florence about 45 minutes before our train was supposed to leave. We had not bought our tickets yet but we had been assured we wouldn't have any problems. Lies. The next three trains were completely full, but luckily there was a train leaving about an hour and half later than we were planning and it would only put us about an hour behind schedule. We got our tickets and decided to chill in the Caffe at the station until our train was here. We had a great time talking, we had not traveled with these guys before so it was a lot of fun getting to know them. Both Alex and Alan were Juniors at A&M and are members of a Christian fraternity BCA (Brotherhood of Christian Aggies) so we all knew the same people (Like Cabby) and had a ton to talk about! Finally it was time to find our platform and get on the train! We found our compartment and met a nice Italian guy who was going to share our compartment with us. He slept most of the way and had terrible B.O. but he was very nice, and told us where to go to get the best gelato in Milan. Anyone who can point my in the direction of the best Gelato is a friend in my book.

The train ride was 3.5 hours and filled with Alan singing along with his Ipod, Alex drifting in and out of sleep and the three of us girls switching between magazines, catching up on journaling and videotaping Alan singing off tune. Over all it was a great ride and we laughed a lot. We finally arrived in Milan at 10:30pm and as soon as we stepped off the train and looked around (Milan has a beautiful trainstation) we were met by Bruno. Everytime I said his name I thought about Uncle Mike Fod! Bruno is a native Texan who actually, come to find out, lives off of Cambell Road in Houston, so about three minutes away from all of my family in Houston. He graduated from A&M, got his masters, and then moved to Milan about three years ago and knows the city like the back of his hand. Alex knew him from BCA so they were already good friends. The guys took us to find our Hotel and we got our first glimpse of Milan. Basically I would have to say Milan is a pretty city in the same way New York is a pretty city. Expensive stores line the streets, and window shopping is incredible. Its really just a huge City, completely different from Florence or Rome. The only efficient means of transportation is by subway (again like New York) and without Bruno I know we would have gotten lost instantly, their subway system is HUGE.

The next day, Saturday the 31st, the guys picked us up at our hotel at 9:30 and Bruno had the whole day planned for us. He took us straight to the Duomo of Milan, which was one of the most beautiful and freakiest Duomo's I have ever seen. I say freaky because the whole outside of the church is "decorated" with statues of martyed saints in the exact position they were martyred in. Actually, that is why this is the only Duomo that will never be finished. They will continue to add on saints and Popes forever. Not exactly a cheerful look, but definetly one that makes you stand in awe for a few minutes. We went inside of the church which was also incredible and I have a few pictures of it up there on the slide show! To get in you have to pass a few police men checking bags, but I didnt realize this and just walked on through. They stopped Emma and Lee but they never bothered me. When I asked Bruno if it was a problem he said no, they didn't stop me because I looked like an Italian woman and they typically only stop Americans. This ofcourse made my day (it was one of my goals to be mistaken for a native Italian woman by a local and I had just fooled 4!!) SO I can go home happy now. hahaha.

After the Duomo we did a little more sightseeing, went to a really cool castel: Castello Sforesco. We also walked through a gorgeous park that was huge and soooo green. There were people holding hands and cuddeling and kissng everywhere in that park. We crossed a little bridge that had a ton of locks on it, we asked Bruno about them and he said that every time a couple decided to get married they would bring a lock with their names etched on it, lock it on the bridge and throw the key into the river under the bridge. We girls were just oodeling over this idea, pledging one day we would come back, Alan and Alex said it made the bridge look dumpy...boys...no appreciation for the beautiful things in life!

After all of the sighseeing Bruno took us to the train station and we bought tickets to go to Lake Como!! We took a 50 minute train ride there, got off and bought a ticket to get on a boat that would take us to a couple little towns off of the lake so we could get off and explore. Of course the lake was beautiful but it was a little gray out so the pictures above probably do it no justice. We got off at a little town called Cerenobbio. It was a cute little town right off the Lake. We got some gelato and headed up the hill (or mountain it felt like!) to get a better picture of the lake below and then walked down it. We got back on the boat after about an hour of hiking and snapping pictures and headed back to the mainland. Once we got there we hopped back on the train to Milan. We were pretty hungry by the time we got back to Milan so Bruno took us to a very chic restuarant for "Happy Hour". Happy Hour in Milan is a lot different than in the States. In Milan at about 8 o'clock pm Happy Hour begins, and at this particular restuarant you pay 8 Euro and you get a drink (I chose a Mojito) and you get to munch on an extravagant all you can eat bar. The variety of food was incredible and it tatsted so good. We aren't talking a CiCi's pizza buffet here, we are talking high class food, it was amazing. We sat and talked for a really long time and left around 10pm. We were stuffed but Bruno swore he knew where the best gelato was so we went and tatsted it...two gelatos in one day...forget the freshman 15, I'm reachin for the Italian 30! It was great but I was so over stuffed that by the time we reached our hotel it was all I could do to stay awake long enough to get into bed!

We wanted to catch a 7 am train the next morning to go to Cinque Terre so the guys picked us up at 6:30am. We made it late to the train station and didn't make our train, and as frustrating as that was it turns out it was a huge blessing. At 7:15am there was a train station strike somewhere in the region and all of the trains that go into that region (which would have been ours) stopped running for the day. So while we would have made it to Cinque Terre, there was little chance we would have made it back to Florence that night like we were planning. We decided to call it a weekend and head back to Florence on an 8:30am train. We caught it and went home and we just lounged around Florence for the rest of yesturday and today. It was a fantastic weekend, but we were exhausted.

So that was my weekend in Milan! I hope you are all doing well! I think about each of you often and miss you tons! Thanks for keepin up with me, it means a lot to me! Have a great week! I will talk to you soon!

Love, MK