Parks near Milan’s City Centre

>> This article continues from: Milan’s Best Parks

At the other end of the city, the southeast end, we find Parco Enrico Forlanini, a vast green area not far from Linate airport. Devoid of fences and always open to the public, it features several small marvels including a mill, a few old farmhouses, and a small Romanic church.

This area hosted the Baggio quarries (in Italian “cave”) until the 1960s. In the 1990s it was then turned into this big park, consisting of lakes (covering an area of 29 hectares), vegetable and flower gardens, walking/running and cycle paths, children playgrounds, a volleyball field and also dogs areas. During the summer, mobile-cafes and portable chemical toilets are installed on site.

Parco del Ticino can be experienced in a number of different ways and offers a myriad of outdoor activities: trekking, biking, rafting and horse riding…
The trails of the park allow visitors to relax and enjoy the marvels of nature: 650 km set within lush green surroundings, along stretches of water, in the proximity of buildings that tell the story of the People of the Ticino Valley. Among the best-known trails, worthy of particular note is the E/1 trail that crosses Europe from Capo Nord to Capo Passero in Sicily, winding through Parco Ticino along a stretch of land measuring almost 130 km. Visitors can also enjoy discovering the park on the saddle of a mountain bike: 122 Km of interconnecting cycling tracks leading to 23 beaches along the Ticino river.
The park also offers a number of year-round leisure-time options. Not only culture and art in Pavia, Vigevano, Magenta or Abbiategrasso, but also evocative atmospheres in farmhouses given over to agriturismo or ancient abbeys such as Morimondo, located in a green area situated between the Navigli and the Ticino river. The area is also renowned for its gastronomic fare.