This was our “bonus day” because we were originally scheduled to leave the day before but Delta canceled our flight. (this was months ago so no last minute surprise.) So we got up early to take Pat and Bob to the airport. I could tell they really enjoyed their time in Italy and we loved having them here with us. We all got along so well!
We came back to the hotel for breakfast and drove back to the airport to return the rental car, thankfully a totally uneventful experience.
We took the Malpensa Express train to Cadorna Station and walked to the Duomo. There were a lot of people in front so we decided to go around to the side to climb to the top, first. It was a pretty easy climb and very rewarding. It’s really great to be so close to the details of the beautiful cathedral.


After a while we came down and went inside. The place was totally full because they were having a real service in there—closed circuit TVs and all. We were able to walk around the periphery and admire the floors and the stained glass, light a candle and listen.

From there we walked to Peck, a high point for a gastronomic pilgrim like me. I loved wandering around the beautiful food displays and bought a small bottle of Garda olive oil, I had wanted. The prices are outrageous there but it IS Peck after all. We walked through the Galleria doing a minimum of window shopping, we watched a perfectly coifed and made up, woman trying on sunglasses at Prada –she was waking in and out of the store with various pairs and a small compact mirror, to check them out.
Inside the Galleria:

I really wanted to eat at the Obika Mozzarella bar so we went into the Rinascente department store to find it in their “food court” at the top.
On the way up, I spotted 2 purple plaid dishtowels, which I had to have. They were on sale, of course! Lunch at Obika was fun in a very big city, fast food way. I got something other than what I ordered but I loved it! It was a plated sized bruschetta—the slice of toasted bread was huge—topped with perfectly ripe, quartered, cherry tomatoes, black olives, small pieces of buffalo mozzarella, big caper berries, a little fresh basil and ricotta salata grated on top. I drank a nice white with it but I don’t remember what it was. Ken ordered (and got) pasta with zucchini a light pesto sauce. It was very noisy and hub bubby in there but great fun sitting at the bar watching the people work making the salads—a very well oiled machine.
We started walking back towards the train station. We saw a man sitting on the sidewalk carving vegetables for money. I took a few last pictures of the big beautiful city.

Back at the hotel I worked on fitting everything into the checked bags. It’s just a puzzle; I can do it.
We went downstairs to the hotel bar to watch the USA soccer match and have something to eat. We had some prosecco and a plate of salumi and cheeses. I was thinking—we could have this for dinner at home sometime but where do you get this quality of meats? Here, even at the bar at the Ramada, there was an excellent assortment. Since we were the only ones in the bar and they were playing atrocious music over the broadcast,
We finished watching the game in our room.
Tomorrow we catch the plane back.
It’s been absolutely perfect!