Since we are only staying in each city for one or two nights, our goal for this trip is to see as many of the highlights of each town as we can while taking advantage of the siesta hour and late nights to slow down and enjoy a little bit of the culture. We are using my old friend Rick Steves Spain 2010 as our guide while we're here. Rick and I go way back as this was my go to guide while I was living in London. I think it is a great guidebook when you are visiting a city for a only a few days as it provides a good overview of all the main tourist attractions through self guided walking tours. It also provides self guided tours of most major museums so that you see all the major pieces without getting lost in a sea of art and artifacts. And with that our Spanish adventure begins...
After a 9 hour flight, we were happy to finally touch ground in Madrid. We decided the airport must be new because it was very nice and well-organized. I think it's safe to say you can judge an airport by how easy it is to navigate immigration. And, it's always nice when they have lines on the ground telling you exactly where to go! (Helpful Hint: We didn't have to pay a commission to exchange money at the American Express Currency Exchange at the airport...a surprising benefit since commissions can be pretty high!)
Now for our first obstacle - how to get to the hotel. We debated taking a taxi to our hotel in downtown Madrid or trying to navigate the metro system after only a few hours sleep and with all our luggage. Since traffic can be bad and the taxis are high, we opted for the Metro and found it to be very easy to use. It is clean and safe and got us to our hotel with no problems! (We also saw our first Aggie not 1 hour after getting off the plane!)
We are staying at the Roommate Oscar in Madrid (http://www.room-matehotels.com/). It is a boutique hotel just a short walk north of all the tourist attractions. It is quite swanky (but reasonably priced) for us, but a fun change from our normal sleeping arrangements. After checking in, we dropped off our things and immediately hit the ground running.
The Prado Museum
So this is where we officially begin our tour of Madrid. I'm not going to lie... I'm not a huge art person, but since Drew has an extensive art background (and by this I mean one art history class and a drawing class), he likes to take advantage of the great European collections. Along with Drew's art "expertise," we used the self guided tour in the guidebook and the audio tour guide provided by the museum (at 3.50 euro not a bad option). This museum was definitely impressive, even for this art novice. Spain has managed to fill it with quite a lot of great art that even I can appreciate. There are hundreds of works of art from Goya, Rafael, and El Greco just to name a few. Some of our favorites were the Tres de Mayo, Saturn Devouring His Son, and El Perro (all by Goya). This is the first of three art museums that we are going to visit in Madrid, so lots more are to see!
After the museum, we walked to the Parque del Buen Reiro. This is Madrid's version of Central Park, and it was huge! It was full of people enjoying the late afternoon, playing dogs and lots of runners. We had a short coffee break and did a little people watching. We even saw a couple get engaged as a group of strangers cheered them on when she said yes!
With a little more energy after coffee, we jumped on the number 27 bus to see a little more of Madrid outside of the main tourist area. I must definitely recommend this as a way to see a city on the cheap side. We rode the bus to the end of the line and passed the US Embassy, the home of the Real Madrid soccer team, and the business district. All of this for only 1 euro!
For dinner, we opted for a short pub crawl to try the famous tapas as well as have some wine and beer. At this point, the lack of sleep was catching up to us so we only managed to get to two places before we were full and completely worn out. We walked along the pedestrian Calle de Huertas and landed in the Cafe Miranda. Here we had a little wine and my favorite tapas: pollo croquettes and queso de cabra (goat cheese). This was a nice find as it was reasonably priced with a nice staff. While here, we also couldn't help but notice how many English speakers are in this city. At this small bar, there were at least three tables full of people chatting away in English. Granted...we tend to notice this more now after living in a city where our dinner conversations stand out, but it was still surprising. After finishing our wine here, we moved onto a microbrewery - the Cerveceria de Santa Ana and Naturbier Microbrewey. This time we tried the Jamon iberico and manchego cheese (with a little salad so that we would have some greens!). Both were excellent choices. So far...not disappointed by the food!
And, that about wraps up Day 1!
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