Brera Museum was free to visitors during Milan's Culture week.

Carol and Mom at our B&B breakfast table.

Carol with our room safe. When she brough out this tiny green tin box with a tiny silver key and told us the was the room safe, we collapsed laughing.

When we arrived in London, Heathrow, we stopped to check our schedule and to see how long we had before our connecting flight to Milan. I looked at my wrist to check my watch and BINGO, my watch was gone. I had been in London for 10 minutes and I had already lost my watch. I recall stopping to change the time. I think I must not have tightened the strap well enough and it fell off while I was struggling with my luggage. I had an over the shoulder bag and my rolling carry-on suitcase as well as another rolling carry-on with all of our toiletries inside of it. You cannot believe all the stuff we took on this trip. It was ridiculous. No wonder I lost track of my little Winnie the Pooh watch. LOL
Anyway, I didn't spend anytime worrying about the watch or even looking for it. I went into Harrod's at the airport and purchased a watch with a black wrist band and a black face with silver hands. Behind the hands, a cute picture of a West Highland White Terrier to remind me of my Kasey girl at home.

When we got to Milan, we took a bus from the airport to the central train station in downtown Milan. It's about a 30 minute bus ride on a road simular to a US highway/freeway. When we arrived at the train station, we tried to find a telephone to call the bed and breakfast to tell them we had arrived and would be taking a cab to their location. We couldn't figure out how to use the telephones to save our lives. We read the instructions several times and still had no luck connecting to the B&B. Giving up that idea, we walkted to the Taxi stand. As we walked over there, I rolled my suitcase through dog poop. Oh, god! ICK..... I couldn't believe I'd done something so disgusting. I found some grass and pulled my suitcase thru it and got most of it off - thankfully.

As we walked up to the taxi stand, the driver of the first Taxi started loading our luggage in the back of his cab. We asked him if he had a cell phone so we could call the B&B. "No, phone." he replied gruffly. We explained that we had to call the B&B before going. He told us he didn't understand so Cari told him, in her basic Italian about our problem. He turned and started pulling our luggage out of his car. He was NOT happy at all. He was saying things in Italian that we knew were angry words toward us. Cari told him, in Italian, "We are so sorry." He turned to her and in great English said, "You're sorry! I'm trying to work here."

He pulled the last suitcase out of the car and pushed it toward us saying more angry words in Italian. All of us stood there, smiling and saying, "You, too!" like he was wishing us a good day. Later, we would laugh hysterically about this and it is in our "Top 10 Most Embarrassing Moments".

When we realized that we were not going to be able to call ahead, we found another Taxi and went to the B&B unannounced. Luckily, our hostess was there waiting for us. She met us at the door off the street and lead us through an entry with beautiful marble floors to a small, and I do mean SMALL elevator. She loaded the luggage and then sent it and Mom up to the 2nd floor while the rest of us climbed the stairs.

We got everything inside and she showed us to our room which was actually 2 rooms and a private bathroom. In the main room, there were two twin beds (for Cari and me) and a dining table with 4 chairs. In the next room, there was a queen size bed (for Carol and Mom) and the doorway into the bathroom. It was a great set up for us.

Our hostess, Manuella, made us comfortable and then left us for the night. After she left, we laughed for about an hour about the day. We laughed about me losing my watch and dragging my suitcase thru dog pooh. We howled about the angry taxi driver and how stupid we must have looked as we grinned at him, nodded and said, "You, too" while he was cussing us out. It felt so good to laugh until our sides hurt. It was a great stress reliever. Little did we know those funny things were just the first of many hilarious adventures.

My favorite piece of art work was di Vinci's Last supper. We got to go see it on our 2nd day in Milan. We were very lucky to have this experience. As you enter the sacred place, you must wait with your group in a small room with wooden benches to sit on. When it's your turn, a guide takes you into a corridor leading to the room to see the painting. You walk thru several glass chambers. In each one, you stay for about 30 seconds while your body cools to the temperature of that chamber. You move to the next chamber which is cooler. You wait, again, until your body cools. You go into another chamber where the temperature is the same as the room that holds the painting. As soon as everyone's body has cooled, they allow you in to see the painting. Only 15 people at a time are allowed to view The Last Supper for 15 minutes. At the end of the 15 minutes, they let the room stand empty for 15 minutes so any body heat and/or humidity that has been created by the last group will dissipate.

The experience had all four of us in tears. It was so emotional and special to be in the presence of this painting. On the wall across from the Last Supper is another painting by several well known artists of the day of the Crucifixion. That was such a beautiful depiction of that day. It also brought tears to our eyes.

I loved Milan but it's not one of the cities I would revisit. It's just too difficult to move around. So many people that the buses, streets, stores, restaurants are all crowded and uncomfortable.

Milan Elevator Trauma

Elevator Trauma


Let me explain about how the Italians number the floors of a building. There is the ground floor, then the first floor and then the second floor, etc. In some buildings there is the lower ground floor, the ground floor, the upper ground floor, and then the first floor, the second floor and so on and so on. I am telling you this so you can picture it and realize that when your room is on the second floor, you have to climb a lot of stairs to get there. Also, in our B&B, the second floor is on, what we consider to be the third floor. When you're tired, it's a difficult journey. LOL

The second afternoon we were in Milan, the four of us had gone out to see The Last Supper. Upon our return, we were exhausted from all the walking and a very long bus ride (we got on going the long way) so we decided to take the elevator up to our room. The elevator was approximately 3 feet wide and 3 1/2 feet deep. Tiny! The four of us got in and closed the door. We were shoulder to shoulder and face to face. I pressed the 2nd floor button. We felt the elevator move and then stop suddenly. I pressed the button again and NOTHING. The elevator would not budge. Of course, this elevator was probably installed in long ago because there is no phone to call for help. There are no buttons to push to open the doors. After trying the buttons again, we realized we were stuck. This baby wasn't going anywhere.

Cari and I started laughing. I'm sure it was to release some tension. My sister started to panic because she has claustrophobia and my Mom was trying to keep order by telling us not to worry. "Press the emergency button!" my sister suggested. We pressed the button and could hear a loud buzzer go off. Ah, hah! Someone in the building would surely hear it and come to our rescue. Well, five minutes passed and no one showed up to help so we pressed it again.................and again..................and again. No response.

"I can see the headlines now." I laughed. "Four American women found dead in tiny elevator."

My sister didn't think that was funny at all. My assertive daughter said, "I've had enough of this."
She moved to the front of the elevator and with my help, we pried open the doors. We didn't know if we were stuck between floors or what but we couldn't wait for rescue any longer. We pried open the doors and luckily, we could open the outside door which lead to freedom. We had to step down about 2" from the elevator to the floor. When we got outside, we realized that we were still on the ground floor. The elevator had only risen 2" before it shut down.

We started laughing so hard that we could hardly get up the stairs. We had been panic stricken by a 2" rise in elevation. How embarrassing would it have been if the fire department rescue unit had shown up and we were only 2" off the ground?

We found out later that we had exceeded the weight limit and the elevator went into overload. It automatically shuts down if there is too much weight so that it doesn't get stuck between floors or plummet to the ground when it tries to lift that much weight up several floors.

Phew! We were lucky. This is also on our list of Top 10 Embarrassing Moments.