Back when we spent a weekend in Madrid, we stayed with my college roommate, Parker. It was awesome. Since we both were living in Europe, it was just a matter of time before Parker came to us in Milan. As luck would have it, his train wasn't scheduled to arrive until about 9:00 on a Saturday evening, so Jenna and I decided to spend Saturday north of the city in a place called Bergamo.
Bergamo only existed as an airport to us, as that's where the airport is which Ryanair flies out of (side note, they should've spelled "air" with a Y and made themselves a palindrome). We'd been there plenty of times, but never left the airport. The town - small city, really - is at the foot of the mountains and signifies the start of the massive valley that Milan rests in.
We took a train to Bergamo and walked through the lower part of the city - Citta Bassa, in Italian - which is mainly modern. Many things are older than those you'd find in the States, but that doesn't really mean anything in Italy. There were some art museums and some nice public areas, but we ended up taking a stroll straight to the funicular that goes up to Citta Alta - the upper city. For some reason, once we found it, we walked up to the city instead of taking the funicular.
The upper city is walled in a medieval style, so the walk up includes walking along the wall and through a city gate.
The first thing we did in Bergamo was walk directly through the old town and continue going up to San Vigilio, which is actually atop the hill/mountain. There's an old ruined-castle up there that offers the highest-views possible and doubles as a public park. It's really quite lovely to just walk up to the higher town-center, and once you arrive the experience becomes more magical.
Tucked back in the center of town is the Piazza Vecchio and Duomo. The church was pretty inconspicuous from the outside, but inside was very impressive. Unfortunately, no photography was allowed, so you'll have to take my word for it. We ate some chocolates, as Bergamo has lots of wonderful bakeries, and we then waited for sunset. Sitting along the walled top of the Citta Alta, the end of daylight was delightful.
We planned to go straight to the train station, but Parker's train ended up being 3 full hours late, making his train the final arrival into Milano Centrale that night. It was a strange experience, but I picked him up around 1:00 a.m...after the trains had stopped running. We had to get off of one train and go back to the street and cram into a bus with everyone else who couldn't fit on the train. It was not a great "welcome to Milan" for him, but it's fun to remember.
The next day was a bit more fun. We went to Como for a few hours and took the funicular up to Brunate, hoping to visit the lighthouse which we'd never been to. It turned out that the lighthouse was a substantial distance from the top of the funicular, so we had a long walk along winding roads to reach it and one other "attraction" which proved to be a drinking fountain. Oops.
The downside was that the day was incredibly hazy, so some of the photos didn't turn out as well as we'd hoped, but the upside was that it was a fairly warm day considering it was early March in the mountains.
Sunset was nice, too.
We were able to have a little fun on Monday when we did something that Jenna and I had been putting off for months: We went onto the roof of the Duomo in Milan. It wasn't terribly expensive and it was completely worthwhile - especially since we had a nice, sunny day. Much like the day before, it was too hazy to see the mountains off in the distance, but it was still remarkable to see the detailed work on the figures that were well over 100 feet off the ground.
Somewhere, someone took a photo of us together. I don't know if it was Parker or Jenna, but the only photographic proof I have that he came to visit is a shot of him looking through the windows back into the church.
So that was that. A fun weekend in and around Milan with a pair of good people.
Bergamo only existed as an airport to us, as that's where the airport is which Ryanair flies out of (side note, they should've spelled "air" with a Y and made themselves a palindrome). We'd been there plenty of times, but never left the airport. The town - small city, really - is at the foot of the mountains and signifies the start of the massive valley that Milan rests in.
We took a train to Bergamo and walked through the lower part of the city - Citta Bassa, in Italian - which is mainly modern. Many things are older than those you'd find in the States, but that doesn't really mean anything in Italy. There were some art museums and some nice public areas, but we ended up taking a stroll straight to the funicular that goes up to Citta Alta - the upper city. For some reason, once we found it, we walked up to the city instead of taking the funicular.
The upper city is walled in a medieval style, so the walk up includes walking along the wall and through a city gate.
The first thing we did in Bergamo was walk directly through the old town and continue going up to San Vigilio, which is actually atop the hill/mountain. There's an old ruined-castle up there that offers the highest-views possible and doubles as a public park. It's really quite lovely to just walk up to the higher town-center, and once you arrive the experience becomes more magical.
Tucked back in the center of town is the Piazza Vecchio and Duomo. The church was pretty inconspicuous from the outside, but inside was very impressive. Unfortunately, no photography was allowed, so you'll have to take my word for it. We ate some chocolates, as Bergamo has lots of wonderful bakeries, and we then waited for sunset. Sitting along the walled top of the Citta Alta, the end of daylight was delightful.
We planned to go straight to the train station, but Parker's train ended up being 3 full hours late, making his train the final arrival into Milano Centrale that night. It was a strange experience, but I picked him up around 1:00 a.m...after the trains had stopped running. We had to get off of one train and go back to the street and cram into a bus with everyone else who couldn't fit on the train. It was not a great "welcome to Milan" for him, but it's fun to remember.
The next day was a bit more fun. We went to Como for a few hours and took the funicular up to Brunate, hoping to visit the lighthouse which we'd never been to. It turned out that the lighthouse was a substantial distance from the top of the funicular, so we had a long walk along winding roads to reach it and one other "attraction" which proved to be a drinking fountain. Oops.
The downside was that the day was incredibly hazy, so some of the photos didn't turn out as well as we'd hoped, but the upside was that it was a fairly warm day considering it was early March in the mountains.
Sunset was nice, too.
We were able to have a little fun on Monday when we did something that Jenna and I had been putting off for months: We went onto the roof of the Duomo in Milan. It wasn't terribly expensive and it was completely worthwhile - especially since we had a nice, sunny day. Much like the day before, it was too hazy to see the mountains off in the distance, but it was still remarkable to see the detailed work on the figures that were well over 100 feet off the ground.
Somewhere, someone took a photo of us together. I don't know if it was Parker or Jenna, but the only photographic proof I have that he came to visit is a shot of him looking through the windows back into the church.
So that was that. A fun weekend in and around Milan with a pair of good people.
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