The country of tapas, siestas and football :)
My first ever sangria :) Didn't finish it of course... but it was alright.
Our tapas meal at 11pm! The streets were bustling with people like it was 8pm!
Our apartment.
We were on the top level which meant we had to climb 4 flights of stairs every time! It wasn't really an apartment. It was more like a room that had a kitchen, washing machine, fold out bed and bathroom squished into it. It was okay because we were only there to sleep and shower and the location was fantastic! Really close to everything!
The lively street full of restaurants that our hotel was on.
Literally, when you opened the front door, this was what we were greeted with.
Our first full day in Madrid began with breakfast at Majaderitos, the only restaurant that was open at 9ish for breakfast.
I didn't know but apparently having churros for breakfast is the thing to do in Spain. Fried donut dough dipped in a cup of pure melted chocolate for breakfast? No thanks. No wonder that lady looks like she does :P
This man's job is just to serve churros. What a great job!
Kum and I were slightly healthier and went with tea, coffee and croissants for breakfast :)
We were in a rush to get to the town square, Plaza Mayor (the tourist trap), for our free Sandeman's Walking Tour of the city.
Plaza Mayor - doesn't look that impressive in this photo.
Our tour guide:
was a very lively chap who loved clapping his hands together when he wanted to make a point.
This statue is of King Philip III on a horse. Apparently, there are stories told that this statue once had a pile of dead birds in the stomach of the horse as little birds would find the opening in the horse's mouth, get stuck and not be able to fly out of the statue.
Botin - the oldest restaurant in the world.
Honest! Look, it's even got a certificate for it :)
Found this funny - clearly she wasn't getting the message.
The Suicidal Bridge... I wonder why...
The last part of Madrid's old city walls.
Catedral de Santa María la Real de la Almudena, or in shorter words, one of Madrid's Catholic Cathedrals. Started building in 1883 and finished in 1993. Yes, took a very long time to be completed!
Palacio Real de Madrid - The Royal Palace of Madrid.
It was too wide for me to get a whole photo of it. We went inside but it wasn't that impressive.
I loved the street signs here. Some of them had a painted picture of the actual place or the significance of that street name.
Obviously it was named after Isabel :)
The Theatre.
The Museum of Jam... I mean Ham. When our very helpful accommodation guy was telling us about places we could go too, he mentioned that we must visit this Museum of 'Jam' because it was fascinating how they hung it up all over the walls. Because of his accent, we thought he said jam and therefore was a little bit confuzzled when one, there was a museum of jam in the first place, and two, why he was so keen for us to visit it. But eventually, we realised that he was talking about HAM not JAM! :P The Spanish LOVE their ham. You can get ham with everything here!
There's the 'jam' hanging on the walls :)
Oso and Madrono - Madrid's symbol for the city.
The bear represents the fertile soil of Madrid while the tree symbolises the aristocracy.
The 'Shakespear' of Spain - Miguel de Cercantes: a novelist, poet and playwright.
One thing I loved about Spain was their beautiful parks and gardens.
This park was called Parque de Beun Retiro. We missed out on seeing the Crystal Palace.
I loved how these trees where so little and shaped like a dome.
On our way back from the park, we stumbled across this building. We could see fruit stalls from the outside and thought it might be some supermarket of some kind. But little did we know, it would turn out to be the best find in Madrid :)
Mercado de San Miguel - a Queen Vic Market (only better) in the middle of the city! :D
The food there was amazing! If you go to Madrid, you definitely have to visit this market! The food is as Spanish as it gets :) This was and is my favourite place in Madrid :)
We lined up in the long queue to go inside the Royal Palace. While we waited for about 30mins, we were serenaded by this man on his violin. He was very talented and played classic songs that everyone knew and started singing to :)
The Cathedral from the front entrance.
Ta da! The Royal Palace :)
View from the top.
The Spanish are also known for bull fighting and on our walking tour, our guide mentioned that every evening at 7:30 you can go and watch bull fighting at Plaza de Toros. So we made the confusing trek there (changing from this train line to the other) only to arrive there and discover that it was not on that weekend. We were so disappointed. Though maybe it was a blessing in disguise as I've heard it's not the prettiest sight when a person or bull gets hurt :(
Madrid had funny weather while we were there. The day was super sunny and hot but at around 8pm, there would be a downpour. We made it back just in time before the rain came. We were heading out to dinner but had to postpone it for an hour until the rain stopped. Dinner was at 9:30pm at this place:
The menu that Kum and I got very frustrated with. We couldn't understand what we were actually getting for 18 euros even when we asked about 3 different people!
We went to a bar that had a live Flamenco show :) It was fantastic! And we were so close to the stage! I didn't realise flamenco dancing involved so much stomping of the feet!
My flamenco pose in front of the bar - Tablao Flamenco :)
You could never go hungry here in Madrid as food places were always opened until very late. Even when places did close, you could always rely on the good ol' healthy option of churros as this place was open 24 hours!
Not sure if this was the best food to have before going straight bed after :)
We were lucky the on the weekend we were there, they had a small family day out Joust event on. There were many different activities and performances re-enacting the medieval times that the whole family could enjoy. We watched a sword fight and jousting. The performers were great in getting the crowd involved!
But first a parade with the children holding different medieval weapons... hundreds of children standing really close to each other with weapons and most parents watching from the sidelines? Not dangerous at all! :P Actually it was quite cute!
