Milan, Italy

While in Milan, we visited the Sforza Castle, the local fortification that is emblematic of Milan. It was built in the 1360s by the Visconti family as part of the medieval city walls. In the 1400s, the Sfroza family took over and rebuilt it as a much larger castle. Over the centuries, additions and alterations were made. The castle was seen as emblematic of tyranny and foreign rule, so they locals often fought against the inhabitants. It wasn't until Italy was unified in the late 1800s that the castle became a museum and cultural center. The locals then embraced it as something especially Milanese. 

Sforza Castle

Rook-like tower at the corner of the castle

Over the main gate is a bas relief of Umberto the First, king of Italy from 1878 to 1900 (when he was assassinated). He led with a strong, conservative hand that resulted in a few assassination attempts, the successful one being by an Italian-American anarchist on July 29, 1900. 

Umberto the First

In the first courtyard is a statue of St. John Nepomucene, along with an inner tower.

What's a Bohemian saint doing here?

One of the courtyards has a nice reflecting pool.

A quiet spot in the castle

The fort is mostly an art museum now. The most famous work of art is a pieta by Michelangelo, though not the most famous one at the Vatican. This is a late, unfinished work that floated around in various collections until it wound up here. The plan was to have the Blessed Mother and another figure holding up the dead body of Jesus just after being taken down from the cross.

Pieta by Michelangelo

A long and winding path leads through various exhibits, mostly of local artists (of which there has been many over the centuries). Some of the items are from churches, some from public buildings, some from private residences.

Burial monument

Offering the city to the Madonna and Child

Painted statues

More painted statues

Arches

A lot of furniture from various centuries is on display as well. This curio cabinet fascinated me with its representation of the five senses in small, white statues, and tempting vices in the bottom middle.

I would have one of these in my home

A long gallery of paintings and frescos shows the developing styles and tastes in fine art.

Renaissance fresco

The musical instrument section had a lot of different stringed instruments, including some that seemed like a single person could not play them.

Guitars, fairly normal

Some more exotic instruments

Is this supposed to come apart like Voltron?

Some of the basses and violins had fanciful heads on the necks. 

A tough audience to get away from

A famous shopping plaza is the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II. The hallway is multistory. The shops and restaurants are posh, with many famous Milan designers' stores. We did not do any shopping here.

Entrance to the Galleria

Inside the Galleria

Under the dome

The Galleria is on the Piazza Duomo. The Duomo is the famous cathedral of Milan, both large and ornate beyond imagining. 

The Duomo

The church has hundreds of decorations on the outside, with statues and scenes from the Bible.

Tower of Babel

David Slays Goliath

We came on Sunday morning to go to Mass (because that's what the cathedral is for, after all), and got this amazing sun-lit photo. 

The side of the church

The other side

Not a statue, just my son having fun running in the Piazza

Moses and a centurion

Also on the piazza is the Palazzo Reale di Milano, the Doge's Palace. It's an art museum now, so we were not ready for more after the fort's collection. 

Royal Palace

Not too far away is a smaller plaza, the Piazza Mercanti. It was the market place in medieval times. Now the plaza is used for other events. They had a big screen up, maybe for a summer movie program?

Piazza Mercanti with the back of the screen on the left

A balcony overlooking the piazza

More of the piazza and screen

Walking back to the metro, I saw a statue of Giuseppe Garibaldi, a famous Milanese general who fought in the 1800s to unite Italy (he's considered one of the "fathers of the fatherland").

Garibaldi statue

View with the castle in the background

Inspired by a geocache, I went to the Church of San Maurizio. It was a Benedictine nunnery for a long time but now is an art museum. Well, it has tons of art on the walls that can't be moved, so it's not so much a collection as a place with amazing works on practically ever inch of the walls, doors, and ceilings.

San Maurizio church

The nuns' part of the church

They have a famous painting of Noah's Ark with unicorns going up the ramp. This was the geocache destination, so I am in the picture.

Unicorns did make it on the ark?

Another fun facade I found

On the last day, we took a bus to the airport. The bus stop is right by the Lido di Milano, a well-built gateway that seems like it leads to a run-down park. Apparently there's a large pool and mini-golf further back but we didn't see anything nearby.

Run-down sports center?

Impressive carvings

We were sad to leave our vacation but it had been a long three weeks, so it was definitely time to get home.

View of the Alps from our plane

Geocaching July 2023

In July, we were in France and found our first French geocache--[LHAV] Sete - Balaruc #01. It's on a bike path that connects Sete and Balaruc, both on the Etang du Thau, a lake right next to the Mediterranean Sea. The find was easy after I checked the hint.

The non-picturesque view from the cache

In Nimes, I found a virtual cache that included a statue of a matador outside of the Arena. Virtual Reward: Statue Nimeno II is easy to find and taking the photo was rather inconspicuous since everyone else was taking shots too. I had to point out some interesting detail on the statue.

Crazy jacket

Our next country was Switzerland. We stayed in Bern. The first night we went out walking and I found machs na. The name is a phrase used by the architect of Bern's main church, the Munster. The meaning is "repeat my feat," a bit of "top that!" bragging. The challenge was to make a copy of the church in whatever format you can (drawing, baking, sculpting, etc.) and take a picture with it. I did my best with paper and pen.

My lame drawing of the Munster

Gurten Virtual 2.0 is a virtual cache on top of the mountain south of Bern. After going up the mountain (on a funicular train) I had to climb a tower to get a picture with faraway Bern in the background.

Bern with the River Aare in the background

Down by the River Aare, the remains of a tower called "The Blood Tower" is the location of Keine Angst vor dem Blutturm. The tower was part of the city walls. There is no reliable history of prisoners, torture, or executions there. It was used by the mortuary school to bleach skeletons, which drew complaints from locals. The cache was an easy find. I tried to be stealthy but a local sitting on a nearby bench saw me, smiled, and said, "geocache."

View from cache, should have taken one of the blood tower

We took the train to Italy. The first cache I found was a virtual cache in front of the Milan's castle, Castello Sforzesco. The cache is called la conquista del castello. Finders are supposed to take a picture out front and have some sort of "storming the castle" theme. I was just inside the gates, so I said I snuck in like the Trojan Horse of Milan.

Invader rage

I found two caches in the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, a covered but open air mall right next to Milan's Duomo. Le palle del Toro -- Virtual Reward 2.0 is a virtual cache in the middle. There's a mosaic of a bull in the floor where people put their foot and spin three times for good luck. I had a hard time spinning and taking a picture that showed me and the bull.

Some of me, some of the bull

Nearby is another mosaic that has some red marble around it. The marble is interesting because an ancient ammonite is visible in it. The earthcache Milano: Rosso Ammonitico/Ammonitic Red tells about the marble and asks for measurements. And a photo with the roof in it, which is what is below.

The red underneath

A multicache called Milano Curiosa: A.U.F. starts at the back of the Duomo, where one of the blocks shows one of the initials (A or U or F) that marked the marble as "tax-free" since it was part of the church. The cache page lists different coordinates for each letter. I found the correct letter and then the cache near a fourteenth century Catholic Church.

View from the cache

At the front of the Duomo is the start of a three-part virtual cache where cachers need to take their picture with some creatures in art. The cache is CnK: Milano: Due Passi in centro. The first monster is a dragon hidden in the scroll-work next to the main door. It is very hard to see the dragon/dinosaur/snake in the photo below, but I assure you it is there.

By the door of the Duomo

The second stage is in the Piazza Mercanti. It was a shopping area back in the day. A legend has it that the founder of Milan had a dream where he was supposed to find a pig and follow it to the spot where a new city should be built. The Scrofa or sow is a minor symbol of Milan. Again, the creature is small in the picture but there. 

Sow (positioned like a gargoyle) and me

The final stage was to get a picture at the castle with the emblem of the Visconti, the family that built the first castle. The emblem includes a snake with a person in its mouth. The legend here is that one of the Visconti returned from a Crusade only to discover a snake had swallowed his child. He went into the swamp and killed the snake, retrieving the child (who was still alive!) and ending a terror for the locals. Pretty weird.

Emblem of Visconti

My final find was another virtual, this time taking a picture with a painting showing unicorns going up the ramp of Noah's Ark at San Maurizio church. Milano Curiosa: San Maurizio et gli unicorni is a fun cache to find.

Unicorns over my shoulder

I lucked out on our return trip which was routed through Germany. The Frankfurt Airport has a virtual cache named Willkommen am Flughafen Frankfurt - FRA inside it that asks cachers to take a photo with an airplane at a gate and another photo with proof that you are actually at Frankfurt Airport, not some other place. I took a pic at the duty-free to prove the location. Now Germany is added to the list of countries where I have cached!

Duty-free caching

Airport proof (though not our own plane)

Back in America, I found CAM 2023 - Savage Mill Trail, a part of the Cache Across Maryland set that comes out every year. The idea is that cachers make at least ten finds in various counties in Maryland. There's a picnic in June where finders get together and receive a geocoin for the accomplishment. Since I found this in July, obviously I won't be going to the picnic or getting the coin. The trail runs along the Little Patuxent River, the water that powered Savage Mill back in the day.

View to the river from the geocache

Better view of the river

We did some more work on the Legend of Zelda forest series in Fairland Recreational Park. This cache is LoZ Series: Forest Temple Small Key. The kids enjoyed the creek while I located the cache. 

Shoes off does mean wading!

With the final information from the cache, I was able to calculate the location of the "boss" cache, which was far on the other side of the park. Being a hot summer day, I decided against trekking all the way across. We found a much closer cache, Punch Buggy Orange - No Punch Back. Somehow, there's a car in the middle of the park. We were not sure how it got there but it has definitely been there for a while.

This buggy was punched a lot

The month ended with the grid for "days cached" full and a total of 844 caches. Hopefully we'll break into the 850s next month! And maybe finally finished that Legend of Zelda set.