When you visit Europe, you have to be ready to see BIG cathedrals and castles and villas and public squares. This is the Dom in Milan. This is not our photo. When we were here, it was a very gray day and half of the cathedral was covered with scaffolding for cleaning and repairs. So, we used a postcard instead!
This is the local castle / fort. It is in the middle of town. It was probably never a very good fort since it is made of brick and brick doesn't stand up very well to artillery. It has some museums we didn't see and the grounds in the back have an unexpectedly nice aquarium.
These moray eels are the size of a weightlifters forearm and would scare us to death if we saw them while we were in the water! The aquarium is cute and free. Actually a very nice place to go on a rainy day.
If you visit Milan, you have to see some of da Vinci's stuff. This comes from a set of replicas of models made by da Vinci that are on display in the museum. This is a picture of a model of something he dreamed up to demonstrate that a wing could actually support weight. I guess watching a bird fly by was just too low-tech for his genius!
This is the view looking down on Lake Como from the top of the funicular railway. As you can tell by looking across the lake/valley into Switzerland, we were above the snow line. It was March and still pretty wintery looking. Notice the trees are bare.
Down on the lake, you can ride around on the ferry boats and see the villas. All the villas were empty as far as we could see. They were all built for rich Italians to escape the heat of summer. No one lives here in the winter!
The Italian towns seem to crawl up the side of the hills from the edge of the lakes. The houses are also quite crowded together. We were glad we missed the summer season. Everyone we talked to complained about the incredible mobs of tourists. They said it was so bad you could barely walk around.
Even the churches are along the edge of the water.
This was the neatest looking boat, but we didn't have the time to go flying over the water. We were actually putting around on a tourist boat when this thing went by. The locals all take the hydro if they can because it is so much faster.
We actually ran into friends from when we worked in Saudi Arabia in Italy. They were doing the same thing we were; getting away for March break! They recommended we go up and see the ski area! The view was quite spectacular.
This is the view looking down from the ski resort area at one of the lakes. It is truly a beautiful region.
This is almost the entire island! It is in one of the lakes and, as you can see, completely covered with villas. The only way out is by boat and there is no ferry. This means there are no cars on the island.
This was either completely bizarre or a stroke of genius. It might take a moment ... What you are looking at is a floating swimming pool in a lake.
The alley ways leading up between some of the buildings were quite picturesque. Jim took several photos of them before Alonda pointed out that they actually sell postcards of these things.
Considering how cold it was, we were totally impressed at the 100+ bicyclists we saw training around the lakes. They were really moving!
We were up on one of the hills and actually got caught in a snow storm. It didn't last, but it was pretty intense for March! This is the little diesel car we rented. The first time the engine quit at a stop light, Jim just about freaked out! The car saves gas by turning itself off if you stop for very long. When you push in the clutch and put it in gear, the engine starts up again. Scary until you get used to it! We also rented a GPS to go with the car. The GPS cost more than the car rental and was worth every penny. You cannot even begin to imagine how lost you can get in Italy!
We found a local ceramic museum. There used to be a fairly large ceramic manufacturing plant in the area. The colors were absolutely stunning.
Italy is all about the food and espresso!
The gelato was Alonda's choice!
A lot of the transport around the lake is by ferry boat. The boats were a lot smaller, but they still looked enough like Seattle to be fun.
We are looking forward to being back home for the summer.
