I woke up this morning with a wicked runny nose, worse than it has been the past few days. Sucks being sick while traveling, but it's awesome having Sahna to take care of me :) It's not too bad though, so everything is still mostly going as planned. Today was a pretty special day because we had a reservation to go see a highly sought-after masterpiece - The Last Supper.

We woke up around 8:30 and got ready to head out to reach our reservation at 10:30. Unfortunately, around 9:15, Sahna remembered that we're supposed to actually get there about 15-20 minutes before our reservation, or else we lose it! This is a pretty big deal, especially when you have to reserve your spot at least a month in advance in order to get in. Sahna was legit and actually called in last month at 3:30 AM Texas time to get the reservation in the first place, so this minor slip-up was more than forgivable.

So we scrambled down to our free Italian breakfast (most delicious 5 minutes of my life), checked out of Eurohotel and walked to the Pta Venezia Metro station. Unfortunately, it took us a while to actually find the entrance to the station, so we lost another bit of time there. After asking around, we finally found it, and rushed to purchase our 48-hour Metro pass (5.50€ per pass, definitely worth it since it's 1.25€ for a single ticket - it's paid off after 5 one-way trips). Metros are freaking awesome, because we got halfway across central Milan in under 10 minutes, and got to street level near Santa Maria Delle Grazie just after 10 AM. So we had under 15 minutes to get to the ticketing office. Fortunately, we had snagged a tourist map from Eurohotel the night before, and got our bearings after a few minutes.

Relieved that we made it on time to see The Last Supper

Let me take a second to tell you all something pertinent here. Sahna and I get into a lot of petty arguments about how I always walk faster than her. She's a slow walker under normal circumstances, but I get bored of walking so I like to get to my destination quickly by walking fast. Sometimes, when Sahna gets mad at me for walking so fast, she speeds up and goes into her "fast" walking mode which is whatever is faster than the speed I walk at. I noticed she only has two speeds: slow and fast. Today, however, was a day of discovery. I found a third speed: Sahna's 'I'm late for the Last Supper' speed. I had never seen anyone walk with so much purpose and determination as I did today. It was a sight to behold.

With Sahna turning on the afterburners, and me struggling to keep up (oh how the tables have turned), we somehow managed to reach the ticketing office with 15 minutes to spare, panting and dripping sweat. We were so happy to just be there that we unwittingly paid 3.50€ each for the most worthless audioguides for the Last Supper. We got much more useful information out of our Italy guidebook and the available English information mounted on the sides of the halways than we did from those audio guides. For future reference, save your money and pass up those audio guides.

We did NOT take this picture........or did we? Yes, it's the ACTUAL painting, and it was awesome.

They take security and preservation of the Last Supper VERY seriously over at SM Della Grazie, so we were taken through two de-humidifying chambers before getting our 15 minutes inside the dining hall which houses the masterpiece. It was truly an amazing sight, and sadly they wouldn't let us take pictures to preserve its delicate state. But that didn't stop us! Sahna snuck a picture in as clandestinely as possible, making sure not to use the flash (that's what does the damage anyways), so here it is! Of course, Sahna complained and felt bad that it wasn't a "perfect" shot, but I was happy that we got to take something of ours away from our visit.

As I said, the audio guides were dumb, and I barely learned anything from mine. Our 15 minutes in the refectory ended, and we walked out feeling awesome that we just saw something so iconic. We then found our way to the Leonardo da Vinci National Science and Technology Museum. We got in for a reduced rate of 7€ for being under 26, and walked around for a bit to see some cool (but not mind-boggling) stuff. The only truly mind-boggling thing there was just the sheer variety and ingenuity of da Vinci's inventions and research, especially in the field of human anatomy. Everything else was just kinda "meh, seen it before."

After the museum, we headed back to Eurohotel, picked up our bags, and walked over to Hotel Arno, our home base for the next two nights. We walked up the 4 flights of stairs to get to the Hotel (which is in a building very similar to the older apartment buildings in Mumbai and what is probably more typical of local Italian culture), and found that they're filming a movie in the hotel right now! This was cool at first, but then we found out it was just a student movie, and then it got annoying to have to be quiet all the time and tiptoe around all these wires and dodge crewmembers in the hallways. Anywho, we checked in and then headed down for lunch at the pizzeria next door.

The pizza here was DELICIOUS. I had a Prosciutto e Funghi Pizza and Sahna went with a Margherita pizza. Both of these were delicious and definitely more healthy than Dominos. We spent a good hour and half here working on finishing our huge pizzas while planning our rail reservations for the rest of our time in Italy, including our ferry ride to Greece.

After lunch, we went to the Castello Sforzesco - a castle in Milan that Leonardo da Vinci used to live in at one point. It now has multiple museums, one of which houses Michelangelo's last (and unfinished) Pietá, the name for a sculpture of Jesus. We weren't supposed to take pictures here again, but this time we didn't know until after we took the picture you see here. Fortunately for us and the statue, we kept the flash off again cause Sahna is considerate like that. We saw some other cool paintings and sculptures too, but I wasn't very interested in them. Sahna apparently thought a painting was famous so she wanted a picture next to it. We did see a ton of swords and cool knight armor, though.

We then took the long and scenic stroll down to the Arco della Pace, or the triumphal arch (in my mind, Milan's version of the Arc de Triomphe). It was cool, and there's a funny story behind the horses on top of the arc. They originally faced the opposite direction in honor of Napoleon, who they thought would be impessed and bring the ideals of the French Revolution to Milan. But when they found out he was just another crazy conquereor, they turned the horses around so that their tails would face Paris instead.

After that, we came back to the hotel, recharged a bit, got more annoyed by the loud movie crew who had now moved into the hallway right outside our room. We did some more rail research, and then headed to the station to make our reservations, and were mostly successful. We'll see how it works out when we leave on Monday to get a ferry from Ancona to Patras on the way to Athens.

We then ate at McDonalds (which is wicked expensive here, by the way) because we needed a break from trying all different kinds of foods when we both weren't feeling too well, and now we're back. Thankfully, the film crew has wrapped up for the night, so I hope some peaceful sleep is in the cards. More Milan sightseeing tomorrow!