Milan

 We arrived in Milan on the 7th of June in advance of meeting daughter Valley and her husband Kent who would be arriving in Ravenna on the 12th after a seven-day cruise. It is Valley’s 50th and we thought it would be fun to meet them and take them to some of our old haunts in Italy. At the last minute Air France told us that instead of taking us to Malpensa Airport they would be dropping us off in Linate Airport, which is actually much closer to Milan. The lines for the taxis were extremely long and slow moving and I noticed there was a bus going to the central train station. Since I knew that our hotel was only a few blocks from there I suggested to Cindy that we take the bus!  She of course thought I was joking, but happily agreed. It cost a fraction of a taxi and it was a fun ride into the city.  We arrived at the station, got directions to the hotel and walked there in under ten minutes. It was a relatively modern Hilton, very convenient and comfortable, and they upgraded us to a suite which had access to an executive lounge for drinks and snacks so it all worked out well.  I’m trying to use as many points with various hotels as possible and this was an excellent way to start. 

We had two days in Milan before picking up the rental car at Malpensa; Avis would not allow us to pick it up in downtown Milan without a huge increase in price. On our full day in Milan we decided it would be fun and interesting to take the Hop On /Hop Off tour bus. We have had some that were great (Lisbon, Brussels) and others not so much, but this one was horrid!  After purchasing tickets on the bus, we were told that there might be route diversions and lots of traffic due to Design Week in Milan. We had noticed lots of fashionistas in the hotel, all of whom were taking part in some aspect of Design Week.  The traffic was really bad; they totally missed some of the places we wanted to go and the commentary was always 30 to 40 seconds behind where the bus was, so we were constantly looking back to see what we had missed. No fun at all!

What was fun however was breakfast at the Hilton. We are normally not big on breakfast, but this was the biggest and best spread we had ever seen. The freshest fruits, orange juice made fresh to order, a huge wheel of Parmesan cheese where you just dug out pieces, among other treats. There was an egg section with two attendants making eggs to order and at the other end there was a station for pancakes, waffles, etc. In between were lots and lots of cold meats, many of which I had never seen, and a carbo-rich counter with breads, cakes, cookies, pastries, well you get the picture. Needless to say we did not eat lunch. 

The next day we walked back to the train station and boarded our train to Malpensa airport. I had wandered over there earlier while Cindy was running and purchased two tickets so as to avoid any confusion just before the train’s departure. That worked well and after many stops along the way we were back at the airport.  When I arrived at the Avis desk there were huge lines of people because a good number of flights had been cancelled and folks were trying to get out of Milan any way they could. There was a board with my name on it telling me to go to desk one, the only desk without a long line, in fact I didn’t think anyone was there.  But sure enough a young girl greeted me, asked my name and said, "oh William we have been expecting you."  A quick glance at my license and she handed me my key and wrote where to find the car and I was out of there in under five minutes. Well you know that things aren’t really that easy in Italy!  Turns out she gave me the wrong location for the car and the key had the wrong color of the car so we were rather confounded, especially since no car responded to the lock/unlock buttons.  I happened to find an Avis garage attendant just before he closed his office for lunch and he told me the car was in another garage, a short walk but we would never have found it had we not been re-directed.  

And we’re off…..