Part One: My First Trip to Italy 🇮🇹

Date: Friday 02/27/2026 and Saturday 02/28/2026

Oh Italy, I miss you ever so dearly. The beginning half of my Italy trip was sweet & peaceful. The second half was... interesting. I'm breaking up this trip into a few parts for my blog, so here's part 1 of my trip to Italy.

The plan was for me to depart the office at 10 AM to go to RSW, and Kayla (my coworker) had agreed to take me. The only thing is that silly sausage (Kayla) got pretty drunk the night beforehand, and it was best that we did not use her car with what occurred in it, so we borrowed Allison's. Kayla was talking to me about how she's driven her mom's Porsche, so it should be no problem... girl couldn't get the car to move for 7 minutes, and it turns out it was because she didn't even turn on the car. Anyways, we get there and she drops me off (thanks and love ya, Kayla). I checked in at a kiosk and added my TSA PreCheck number. Once I got to the front of the TSA PreCheck line, the person told me the number wasn't added to my boarding pass, which had me annoyed after waiting. Anyways, they moved me to the front of the regular waiting line, and I got through, then did some work at my gate. I was actually on standby for a while but wasn't worried since I was on an international flight, and I eventually boarded the plane, so it worked out.

My layover was in the Atlanta airport, which many people speak awfully of, but I've only had great experiences at this airport. The Virgo in me goes straight to my gate to make sure it exists, then walks around to find a good airport drink. I found a nicer end restaurant called One Flew South and got myself a nice cocktail with a Caesar salad to pair with the last of my ACA compliance work. It was kind of perfect because I finished my meal as I finished my work hours and met the government deadline for my work at this restaurant. After this, I still had time, so I went to a bar closer to my actual gate that was kind of popping. As I entered, my eyes automatically made eye contact with a clearly attractive Italian man, but he was sitting at a table with what I presumed was a friend, so I took a seat at the bar next to an older woman and ordered a High Noon. She was also going to Milan, and we chatted it up, and she was clearly drunk. Anyways, she finished her glass of wine when I finally got my drink, and she left shortly after. The seat next to me was taken within 2 minutes of that woman leaving by another older woman. I'm in a chatty mood, so I start talking to her, and this woman tells me about how she just met Paul Rudd on her last airplane ride (insane!). Only one seltzer was done at this point, but my flight was boarding, so I headed over to my gate to get on my flight to Milan now.

My only wish when getting onto my flight to Milan was that I got seated next to an attractive man my age... that was not the case. It was an older Italian man (like far too old to even consider). The flight itself was fine on the way there, but I slept awfully, and that's considering I had 3 melatonin gummies, and of the 9 hours I could have gotten, I got maybe 4 hours of sleep. On the last hour until arrival, I locked in and started cleansing my skin, moisturizing, and brushing my teeth so that once we landed at 9 AM, I was able to head straight to a bathroom to change into my first-day outfit and put on my makeup. Walking out of the bathroom, I felt like a new woman, considering I had spent half of the last 24 hours sitting on plane rides.

A huge concern for me when arriving in Milan was that there were no trains running due to protests. An Uber was an option, but I'm a young ho trying to save money, so the only other real option was the bus, which was everyone else's plan as well. It wasn't bad at all to navigate the airport to get a bus pass; the wait was just a bit of an inconvenience in comparison to a train. Anyways, I hopped on an hour-long bus ride to the main part of Milan!

My hotel was near the Central Station for convenience, and I was automatically able to go there to drop off my bags and start exploring! Nearby, I knew there was a photo booth, so I went there first, and it seemed more like a passport photo booth, but it was very cute regardless. After that, I was off to go shopping, and it was abundantly clear I was American by my walking speed because I was walking at 2x speed in comparison to everyone else. In reality, though, the speed still would have had me trampled in NYC. On my way to the stores, I ran into fashion week on the side of the street. Everybody was dressed incredibly, and celebrities were coming in and out of the main building. I was too short to see past people, though, so I just observed people's outfits and then continued my walk (I would walk any place that was like 35 minutes or less because that's the point of walkable cities). I went to one Nespresso store, but it wasn't a boutique store, so I got redirected to another near the Galleria. On the way there, it was lunchtime, and I wasn't too hungry. I stopped at Spun, which is known for a variety of tiramisu flavors. Freaking phenomenal. I asked for their best seller, and I ended up with a pistachio tiramisu, which I ate at a bar-type setup they had outside of their restaurant since the inside was small and packed. After that, the location it took me to was conveniently at Milan's Duomo. The detail on this building was absolutely insane and overall very grand. I spotted two girls and asked them to take photos for me, which they kindly did, and they themselves were visiting from somewhere in South America (can't remember where), but we spoke entirely in Spanish to one another.

The Nespresso boutique store was also very nice, and so was the very hot store associate. They are known to have exclusive pods found in Italy, so I got myself a sleeve and one for a friend. Kiko Milano was next on my list to stop at. Leading up to the trip, I saw so many TikToks on the name engraving they do at their Milano store that I needed it, and I needed it badly. When I walked into the store, it was packed. Then again, it was Saturday and possibly the most touristy area of Milan, so it made sense. I picked out super cute colors for myself, my mom, and my grandma, and I got all of our names engraved on them. It was a bit of a time crunch because I was 30 minutes away from my 3:45 PM ticket, and it was already 3 PM by the time I finally got the engraving after paying and waiting in line. My first ticketed event, though, was to see The Last Supper. I am not the most religious person, but I grew up in a Catholic household, so it kind of just made sense to go. Plus, it sounded cool to see an original Leonardo da Vinci painting. I signed up for a viewing that came with a guide because it was the only ticket available. When I bought it, it said English/Italian, but the guide was clearly disappointed when I showed up and he had to do it in both languages since prior to this it was just a group of Italians who had arrived for the tour. He was still a good guide overall, translating between the two languages and explaining the details of the actual painting once we got inside the room. It was honestly a very cool mural to see in person. It was all I wanted to see, but I stuck through the workshop, which went through the smaller details of the painting. This part was a bit of a bore for me, but I paid for it, so I stayed. It lasted longer than anticipated, so once it was done, I bolted for the bus, which I missed, so I then had to speed-walk to my appointment at 5 PM, which was 30 minutes back to the Duomo.

Yes, this is now, in fact, that appointment... my first tattoo appointment! I found this place via TikTok a few days before I left the States for Italy. It was a last-minute, impromptu decision on my end to book a tattoo appointment in Milan since I was more leaning toward getting it in Rome, as I was originally going for perhaps a cross design to signify my Catholic background. However, I explained to Adriano (the Italian guy I was talking to for like a month and a half that I found on Hinge) that I was between an orchid and a cross, and the flow of our conversation really helped me decide to go the orchid route. It took me a second to find the actual tattoo shop, but once there, I had two women greet me, and they were super cool. The lady who did my tattoo spoke no English and guided me down to the basement-level floor to a back room, which was kind of sketchy, but I have more faith in women than men. And well, yeah, she tattooed my back, and it honestly wasn't very painful at all. I probably flinched more when she touched my back (since it's rather sensitive) than flinching at actual pain. Now, I have a permanent memory of my trip to Milan on my back.

It was already dinnertime at this point for me, so I went back to my hotel to complete my check-in and lay down for like an hour to recharge myself and my phone. While laying down, I scrolled to find a nearby restaurant, which I found, Volemose Bene, which was only a 5-minute walk from my hotel. It was very cute with an indoor and outdoor area. I was seated outside, and when asked what I wanted to drink, I kept it very classy and ordered a white wine. The only reason for this is because cocktails with dinner are fairly uncommon and are more of an aperitivo-type of thing, which happens before dinner. My intention was to ask the waiter what he would recommend between these two dishes I wanted to order, but halfway through my question, he was just like, “you want this dish,” and I simply said okay. That evening for dinner, I had costolette d'abbacchio, which I believe was lamb with puréed mashed potatoes. It was delicious, to say the least, and after that, I headed back to my hotel to take a shower for an early morning the next day.