No, I did not have any cookies

Airlines are strange. Sometimes it's cheaper to stop somewhere else on the way to your destination, so for fun we decided to stop for a night in Milan. We arrived in the afternoon and got lost trying to find our hotel. Eventually we oriented ourselves and were able to find it, and dropped off our gear and took our cameras out to see what we could see. We found a park, a couple of small statues, and some other so-so stuff. At this point we had a good map from the hotel so we found what appeared to be the center of town and headed in that direction. Before we made it there, we found that Milan was being invaded...by GIANT PURPLE SNAILS!



They weren't very cuddly, but they weren't slimy either, so Lisa thought it'd be good to make friends with them. There was also a statue of Leonardo, looking sort of frightening. Perhaps he was directing the invasion.



Luckily for us, we'd found some people out and about, which made us a little more confident in our map skills. We wandered through some nice shopping streets, with stores from all the high end fashion boutiques and technology companies, and a few other places that sell things way out of our price range. It's fun to browse even if the store people know you can't afford it.

Nearing the city center, though we didn't know it, we discovered this nicely lit covered street/shopping area. Apparently it's a really famous bit of architecture.



Since it was pretty late by this time, many of the smaller places were closed. We looked at a few restaurants but decided they were a bit pricey. The rest of the street was cool, from the tiled floors to the lights on the ceiling. I'll say this for Europe: they don't skimp on making things look cool.





The end of this covered street opened into a large square which brings us to...

...THE MAIN EVENT.



This is why we came to Milan. This church is awesome. It's huge, it's gorgeous, it's amazing, and any other really cool adjectives you want to add. According to wikipedia, it's the fourth largest church in the world. I believe it.

It's a nice change from most French churches that use towers rather than the large triangular facade seen here. And like many European churches, just about everything is decorated. The carvings on the face are ridiculous. Sadly, the pictures I took didn't come out clearly, but there are whole scenes from the Bible carved out over the course of several meters in both directions. This door, which includes a Lisa for scale (1.6256m tall), was covered with scenes. Absolutely amazing.



We checked out some of the open stores around the square, then found a nice place to grab a bite to eat. I had pizza (who wouldn't?) and Lisa had gnocchi. We wandered around the back streets a bit, found the back of the cathedral, an old streetcar still in use, and some other cool stuff. But because I am a sucker for churches, you get more pictures of it.

Looking at it from the place. I think this pretty well sums up the awesomeness.



And this is one of the windows on the back of the church. They do such amazing work with stone and glass.



There's a lot more information about it here, so I urge you to take a look.

As always, there are a few more photos on my Facebook album.

Greece Episode III: The Return to Athens

It's not easy to come back to Athens after a few days in the Aegean sun. But there were still monuments to be seen and Greek foods to try and views to see, so we returned for our last hurrah. It was the last night for Bill and Merit and Casey and Anna so we all went out for a nice dinner. Everyone else had to pack, but during this time someone discovered that the fire escape in the hotel went all the way to the roof and if you went up there you could see Athens and this:



Yeah, yeah, I know.

Early in the morning, we saw the family off. After a good breakfast at the hotel, we decided it would be a good time to see the Acropolis proper. So we bought some tickets and walked up some nice marble steps. The first thing we came across was this amphitheater, the Odeon of Herodes Atticus.



It's been recently restored and is actually used during the summer for concerts.

The Propylaea is what you can see in the night shot above. It served and serves as the gateway to the Acropolis. It also funnels tourists, so it's always busy. Pfffff.



The Erechtheion was a temple to either a hero or a king. More pretty ruins.



And of course the Parthenon. Built as a temple to Athena, protector of Athens, it's one of the most recognizable buildings from ancient Greece. It's ridiculously large, though often covered with scaffolding.



Many of the original decorations are gone from the Parthenon, either in the New Acropolis Museum or the British Museum. Some had been replaced with replicas, and there are lots of restored bits in it.



We then headed off to a smaller hill near the Acropolis, the Hill of the Muses. This is where Socrates was imprisoned before his death; the squarish holes were used to put wooden beams into for the structure in front of it.



At this point we'd seen enough of the Acropolis and wanted to catch the Temple of Zeus before it closed at 3, so we headed down and over towards it. It's not very intact, but it was the largest temple built in Athens. The columns are just huge. Unfortunately you can't go right up to it, but this might give you a sense of the scale:



Wait, it's not that big...



Around the temple there were other ruins (of course, there are ruins everywhere) and one of the more intact areas was an old house and roman bath. Apparently you had to be well off to dwell near Zeus, but the floors were preserved and they had mapped out the likely rooms. Pretty cool stuff.



Having seen our ruins for the day, we wandered around. We got into a country club, maybe by accident but it was worth checking out. We also found a forest of orange trees. They really are everywhere.

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We headed back towards our hotel to grab some late lunch. Gyros cost 1.80 euros, which is a fantastic deal considering how filling they are. We also had some coffee in one of the cute outdoor cafes. After a short break at the hotel, we went to the New Acropolis Museum. It's very modern but beautiful at the same time. There are ruins underneath it that you can look at while you're in line, but since it was 5PM we got in immediately. It's dedicated solely to the Acropolis, so the statues and friezes and other artifacts of antiquity all came from the temples on the hill above. It's great, since it basically abuts up to the Acropolis so you can often see exactly what they're talking about. There are no pictures allowed in the museum, but I'll just say this: it's worth every penny. It's well done, there's a lot of information, and everything is organized nicely. They talk about the history of the Parthenon, the various temples and other buildings on it, the statues, what various people did to it over the millenia, and so on. The top floor has a reconstruction of the Parthenon; it might even be to scale. They have columns, as many of the original decorations as they can get, and descriptions of what each one shows. Many battles or heroes are shown, along with gods and demi-gods. Another great benefit is that they don't shoo you out until 8PM. Unlike the yelling ladies at the monuments, who will get you out as soon as they can, the professionals at the museum allowed us to stay right until 8. Here's what the museum looks like from the front; the hole between the columns looks down on some ruins.



We'd planned to go out for some dinner, but we were pretty tired and that didn't end up happening. I did have to take this picture at the hotel though, it's the fresco right in the entrance. It was gorgeous. Everything is so decorated.



On the last day, we decided that we would finally make it to the markets that had been so elusive all the week before. There were tons of meat and fish and squids and shrimps. I tried to snap a few pictures on the sly to give you an idea of what they had. Here, there are fish, shrimp, and octopi.

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Before heading back to Syntagma Square to catch our bus, we grabbed some lunch at a super market. We bought some toast with spices, tzatziki (which is AMAZING), sour cherry juice, and chips. It was so cheap too. Greece >> France when it comes to food prices. Being a nice day, we found a couple of seats in a nearby square and sat down for an hour or so, to eat, relax, and watch the world go by. A quick retrieval of our suitcases from the hotel, a bus pass purchase later, and we were on our way out. We had a nice flight back to Paris, although it was a bit dismaying. As we flew in, I looked out the window and wondered what I was seeing. The roads were all there but it looked like they were over water. It then dawned on me that it was still winter in Paris and it was snow. The captain came on shortly after to inform us that it was several degrees below zero. I still think that it was a mean joke that France played on us. While waiting for our luggage, we bundled up in all the clothes we had; it still wasn't enough. But we were able to make it to the train station and get some coffee before heading back to Rouen.

So, Greece is perhaps the most epic trip I've ever taken. It was gorgeous, warm, full of history and delicious food, and to top it all off, we were there with family/friends. Life really doesn't get any better than that.

Check out the facebook album for more photos; you don't need to be on facebook to see it. I've also added an album for Santorini so that's at the bottom of my previous post.