Milan May 8-12

We will fly from Houston, TX to Milan, Italy.

may 8, 2025 houston to Milan

Today we begin our 2025 European Adventure! Our New Jersey born uber driver this morning was married to a Sicilian for 37 years before his passing. The hour drive to the airport was filled with her Sicilian family stories. Before she and her husband were married her future mother in law would hide her future husband’s passport from him to keep him from visiting her. And the stories continued! Right now we are at the Bush International Airport waiting to board our plane to London.

may 9, 2025 arrival in milan

It was a looong flight from Houston to London. It was our first time going through Heathrow, and we were overwhelmed with all the people and shops. After a layover we boarded our flight to Milan. Both flights were pretty uneventful, but sleeping was not an option. Initially, we had booked a flight into Milan’s Malpensa airport, but British Air decided to change the itinerary and changed the flight into Milan’s Linate airport. The problem with this was, our hotel and friends were closer to Malpensa. So we needed to figure out how get to the other side of town (1 1/2 hour drive away). After roaming around the Milan airport for a while and looking at the options between getting an uber or taking the train (and we would have to change stations) we decided that as tired as we were it would probably be best to pay extra and take the uber. It was well worth it! The traffic was crazy, but the driver had it under control. We checked into the hotel and were very pleased! After an hour nap we got on the road with our friend, Nuccio. He took us on a wonderful walking tour of Busto Arsizio. After the walk we were privileged to visit the home of Nuccio and Anna, where Anna had prepared an excellent meal for us. And she served my all time favorite, risotto! Lots of fun.

may 10, 2025 downtown milan

Anna and Nuccio picked us up at our hotel and we drove to a Metro station. We took a short ride into downtown Milan. Exiting the station was breath taking. The exit of the Metro station was right in front of the Duomo in all of its beauty and glory. We attempted to get tickets for entrance into the Duomo, but they were sold out until late afternoon. So …. Nuccio and Anna took us on a walking tour of the surrounding area. Milan has to be the shopping capital of the world. This is where you can see so many of the familiar brands each with their own store. Gucci, Prada, Lois Vuitton, Nespresso, etc. on steroids. Amazing! After walking around and enjoying store window displays we stopped for lunch at a Sicilian restaurant. Good food and even better company. Then we walked to the Sforza Castle. It has been a splendid day!

May 11, 2025 North of Milan

After a yummy breakfast at the hotel we met up with Nuccio picked us up for a car tour of some of the beautiful sights to the north of Milan. Drove through some gorgeous villages and made a couple of stops along the way. We ran into a few road closures due to events taking place in the various towns. Our first stop was a park in Varese. The park sits on the lake called Lago di Varese and there were several people out enjoying the beautiful warm day. After walking around we stopped in for a coffee. Then we traveled on to Lago Maggiore in a town called Laveno Mombello. We walked on the sidewalk overlooking the lake and watched two ferries arriving from the Piedmont side of the lake. One carried people and the other carried cars. We walked up the hill and we were able to visit the local church.

Then we returned to the home of Anna and Nuccio for another wonderful meal. We spent time looking at family photos from Italy and Omaha. After we finish packing, we plan to meet again tonight to share a pizza and say our goodbyes. We have a taxi booked for Malpensa Airport for our midday flight to Catania tomorrow.