For getting the feel of the milky way, I think there's nothing that is better able to simulate it than a video game, ala Elite Dangerous. I loved to navigate its galaxy map. The size of the Milky Way, the numbers of stars and distances between them are of scale in there if I recall correctly.
I recently contemplated about a thing: on a galaxy scale, the speed of gravity (or gravity change) should have a somewhat noticeable effect. There's a slight pull towards a star on the other side which is not there anymore for 50000 years! Of course there's some other star in that place, but I wonder how minuscule that effect is. Would it speed up or slow down rotation of outer regions of galaxy?