Taking holiday photos to new heights in Milan (and quietly packing it)

After two full days in Venice I made a brief stopover in Milan – less than 48 hours between train journeys. I needed to be in Turin no later than Tuesday afternoon to make it to the first semi-final of Eurovision on the Tuesday evening, however it felt ridiculous to pass through Milan completely so I settled on the flying visit. Honestly though it feels like enough.

This time around the accommodation was a little more modern, and at check-in the receptionist praised me for pronouncing “grazie” correctly and upgraded me to a room with a balcony. I didn’t want to break it to her that while I could pronounce it correctly 80% of the time I had already forgotten almost all of the phrases I learned from two straight months of daily Duolingo lessons.

The excitement of everything, and the guilt of wasting my time here, has meant I’ve had jam-packed days for the entire week since I’ve arrived and I felt like things were starting to creep up on me. So I strolled the streets near my hotel for a couple hours, grabbed some dinner and had a quiet night in.

The next day I made my way towards Piazza del Duomo, the epicentre of the main attractions for my sightseeing checklist. It turns out despite Sunday being the day of rest, these Catholics choose Monday to completely shut up shop at a stack of the major landmarks. But to be completely honest a lot of them were more churches and museums with Jesusy art, and if you’ve been following along so far I’m feeling like Mr Creosote being offered an after dinner mint in the form of another image of old mate on the cross.

I’m full, thanks.

First stop was Santa Maria Presso di San Satiro, a ninth century church with Gothic frescoes. It’s bizarrely nestled in between more modern buildings, and you turn around a corner to be almost confronted by what looks like a run-of-the-mill church. But open the door and you’re hit with these amazing artworks and painted ceilings.

The wall behind the altar is painted in force perspective to look like it stretches on into another room. Shaynna Blaze would be impressed with the use of paint to create the illusion of space.

Shaynna is going to retract that when she finds out the altar doesn’t have face-level storage.

Piazza del Duomo is only a five minute walk away, and is home to Milan Cathedral, the adjacent museum (closed on Mondays) and Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II (more on that in a bit).

Galleria on the left, Milan Cathedral on the right, piggy in the middle.

I’d bought a ticket online for the Milan Cathedral, and chose the ticket option for access inside, a lift to the rooftop where I’d attempt to conquer my crippling fear of heights, and access to the archeological dig which is a swimming-pool size underground pit directly underneath the piazza.

I’ve done the Vatican City guided tour, at St Peter’s Basilica is epic, but there’s something much more grand about the inside of Milan Cathedral. Maybe St Peter’s is dripping in so much gold and decoration while the Duomo in Milan lets the architecture do the heavy lifting? Regardless it wasn’t what I was expecting and the colourful stained glass windows dazzled me while the 52 marble columns supporting this giant structure only made me marvel at the ambition and engineering of it all.

After exploring the inside, and enjoying the cooler temperatures compared to outside, I decided it was time to walk around the back to the queue for the lift. It moved quickly and before I had a chance to back out, half a dozen of us were loaded into the very modern and safe-looking lift which smoothly took us to the top. We made it outside and that’s when it hit me how much I don’t like heights. At all.

I wanted to get the full experience, but my body involuntarily went rigid and I slowly shuffled behind the person in front of me while others around me were casually walking up and down the sloped marble roof on this first tier. I could feel myself being irrational and yet looking up the slope wasn’t an option, and looking down to the right and the quite low railing was DEFINITELY not an option so I kept shuffling forward.

Before getting to the front of the building I had to pass through a group of school children who were jumping around and carrying on like children their age are supposed to. A couple of them stepped in my path and instead of walking up the roof or down the roof to pass them I just clenched every muscle and waited for them to move out of the way.

I’m so fun to take to parties.

We got to the front and there was a steep staircase parallel to the front of the building. What? This isn’t it? I have to go HIGHER than this just to leave? Well at least I can now say I’ve blasphemed ON a church, too.

My thoughts exactly.

We got to the top of the staircase to the actual roof and I had a moment where I thought I’d have to cross all the way to the very back of the building (100-200 metres?) to get to the exit. Just as I was suppressing a panic attack, a Loud American™ (the one time I’ve been grateful to see one) tried to push his way past the people behind me coming up the stairs to go back down again. I would’ve lost my tiny mind if he had tried that on the narrow staircase with me. Luckily a security guard told him off and directed him to use another staircase four metres away that would take him back down.

I’m told it’s a lovely view. I wouldn’t know because my body refused to move down the slope to the edge.

I took a couple photos, held in a little cry and then went the way of the Loud American™ which incidentally revealed a little nook with a ledge and lots of high walls for me to sit and feel safe and gather myself. It also allowed me to take these two photos:

Going up to the very top was fine, my view was the staircase and other people’s feet. Going down the other side was a great reminder of just how steep the staircase was and don’t fall, don’t look down, I wonder if you’d pass out BEFORE you hit the ground or if you’d be conscious right until the end and did I mention I hate heights?

Instead of a lift back down it was a stone staircase but I wasn’t complaining, there were barely any glimpses of the outside world as I made my way down, and it spat me out back inside the cathedral where I sat in a pew, calmed down, mopped the sweat off my face and made my way outside again.

Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II is a historic covered walkway in the shape of a cross, designed in 1877 and now home to luxury retailers, classy restaurants, boutique cafes and OH SO MANY INFLUENCERS.

These photos don’t capture just how beautiful this big open-air structure is, and how lovingly it’s been preserved, but you can understand why people stop to take photos. What I don’t understand is when someone turns up with an entourage (or in a few cases, a long-suffering boyfriend) and does a full on photoshoot in their tight pastel clothing. I have no doubt there’s at least one TikTok out there where I’m in the background scowling as some fool starts twirling while looking at the sky without watching where they’re going.

The likeness is uncanny really.

17,000 steps must be when I subconsciously go “okay that’s enough” because that afternoon after lunch and a long window-shop through nearby streets I was done. The window shopping was dangerous, this is the Paris end of Collins Street on methamphetamine, streets and streets of designer clothing. I don’t own a single piece of designer-label clothing because I love food too much and I take pride in never missing a rent or mortgage payment, but after a couple of hours of wandering around I started to talk myself into buying something. I work hard I have a good salary, I deserve nice things… or at least A nice thing. But it’d have to be something I’d get plenty of wear out of. I very briefly considered purchasing a grey and orange houndstooth blazer I saw in a window display, until my eye caught the price tag marked €1595 (about AU$2,400). Plus I’m not sure if grey and orange houndstooth is much of an all-rounder. For all the ogling there was nothing that made me stop and think “I would LOVE to own that!” so my credit card remains holstered and I’m still good for that next mortgage payment.

I felt like the past week was really starting to catch up with me so I went back to the hotel to chill for a bit and decide whether I wanted to grab dinner on the other side of the city or if something in a one-block radius would suffice. Then I heard a crack of thunder and the decision was made for me.

Next stop on the European escapade is Turin, so depending on how eventful it is you may not hear from me until I’m on my way back to Rome to prepare for the next leg of my trip in Spain. But it’s been three years of build up, excitement, disappointment, COVID delays, etc so I’m just so happy it’s finally happening and I get to tick it off my bucket list. I’m disappointed that unlike the tickets we had for Rotterdam 2020, I won’t be standing up the front beside Mike, Dale and Steve and we’ll instead be scattered across different shows and sitting in different sections. But I have no doubt it’ll be memorable.