Well
hey there, blog readers! I've
been
leaving you in the dark for a couple days, that'll happen on a trip
like this. I'm on a 4 hour train to Granada from Madrid this morning
(finally...more later), so I have some time to sit down and compile
all the happenings from Madrid over the past several days.
Now
where did we leave
off? Oh yea, last you heard, I was inbound to Madrid on a 8:30 a.m.
train...man, that was a long day. I guess the choice to party til
2-3 a.m. was not the smartest idea lol, but whatever, it happens when
doing the hostel thing. So yea, Umayr and I parted ways and I
arrived in Madrid around 11 a.m., lugging my backpack through the
busy Metro and street of Gran Vía
to my hostel. This time, my place was up on the seventh floor of a
high rise, with a layout that reminded me of Ars Hostel back in
Krakow. No common room again, but maybe that's what I get for going
with these smaller hostels. The place also seemed deserted, which
was a bit eerie.
Anywho, Luciano, the host, was nice enough to give me directions and
take my bags since I couldn't check in. So off I went with a few
hours sleep!
First
up, Puerta del Sol, which I got seriously lost finding following the
diagonal streets of Madrid. Amazing, being the navigator that I am
and since this plaza is the center of Madrid. Well I made it,
finding a giant golden Christmas tree, a few walking cartoon
characters (Mickey Mouse, Bart Simpson, Papa Smurf, etc...) and a
pile of tourists. Ok, next stop: Plaza Mayor. Just down the street,
I easily found the square plaza with identical buildings on all
sides. Again, not much to see other than some guys trying to sell
tiny helicopters
like those I saw in Paris and a whole mess of elementary school kids
on a field trip.
Actually,
I ended up following the same group of kids by accident to my next
stop, the Royal
Palace.
It was an absolutely beautiful site, though it's too bad that they
actually enforce the no photos rule (even without a flash). The
armory was my favorite, with tons of suits of armor for men as well
as horses, not to mention all the different swords and other weapons.
The royal chambers were beautiful of course, full of all sorts of
colors and fabrics.
A
short
lunch, then over to the biggest Spanish flag in Madrid (courtesy of
Nikki's friend Javier) over in Plaza
de Colón
and on to the Prado for the free time after 4:00 p.m. I got there at
3:30 p.m. To find that it was the anniversary of the Prado, so the
whole day had been free admission! That's okay, 2 ½ hours was more
than enough time for me in the museum, sleepy as I was, but still it
was very impressive. I especially loved
to watch the people painting the reproductions next to famous
paintings.
Back
to the hostel in the early evening, and only 6 people total in the
hostel! That's what off-season and weekdays bring to the hostel
world. There was only one person in my 4 bed room, but he wasn't
back yet (turns out he was in Toledo for the day), so I just relaxed
for a bit, making some calls back home. And wouldn't you know it?
Sarah showed up!
Okay,
so Sarah was supposed to come with me in the morning on the train to
Madrid. However, when she didn't show up in the hostel lobby at 6:30
a.m., we left without her. Turns out, after being out for the same
rough night (including banging her head on the ground and maybe
getting a concussion), she awoke at 5:00 a.m. to
her roommate Matt (there were 3-5 Matt's in the hostel, I forget)
telling her that their other roommate Sam, a Brit who just came that
day, had peed all over the floor, wall AND out of the window. Out
the window, really? That must've taken some skill in that Barcelona
hostel. Either way, they had to get
up
and move their stuff into one of the other rooms and alert the hostel
(apparently the maid got seriously pissed; I wouldn't blame her).
After the whole fiasco, Sarah
went back to sleep and missed our train, then spent the morning in
the hostel with Iva just trying to get her bearings. In the end, she
got on a later train for Madrid and met me that night at my hostel.
Yay!
We
ventured out on the chilly streets of Madrid, wandering around
talking about everything possible, getting lost and having endless
people
offer us tickets to shows and free drink cards. For dinner, we ended
up at the Mercado
de San
Miguel,
which came recommended by my dad and the hostel. It was awesome,
just the tapas experience
I was looking
for! The place was packed with people scrambling for bite-size meals
at every counter, often only costing €1
each. We had our fill, including some sangria from a nice guy who
let us even take a picture of us pouring it! It might've been a
little more, but his unique mix (so he says) tastes much better,
definitely stronger than the sugary versions I had in Barcelona.
We
walked and talked a bit more, finishing
up at a bakery to
round
out the night. We parted, planning to meet the next day for
sightseeing. Back at the hostel, nobody was still around, so I
cleaned up and went to bed. André, my Brazilian
roomie, ended up waking me up at 2:00 a.m., but other than that I
just passed out.
I
blinked awake at 10:00 a.m., realizing I missed my alarm to call
Sandy (so sorry!) and meet up with Sarah. Rushing through a quick
hostel breakfast, I reached Sarah and we met at Puerta del Sol to
start our tour. First up, Parque
del Retiro
to stroll through the palaces and to see the various statues in this
huge park. We then ended up wandering all over the neighborhoods
looking for food, ending up first at Dunkin'
Coffee (not donuts, guess that's not a European word) for my coffee
and later at Wok
to Walk for
a quick lunch of noodles.
At
this point, we split up, Sarah heading to the Prado while I toured
the Reina Sofía
for a couple hours.
I have to say, while
the Prado is the pride of the Madrid art museums, this one was my
favorite, and not just because I could take pictures. Modern is more
my style and that's what the Reina Sofía
has. The building is HUGE; its four floors used to be an old
hospital. Picasso's Guernica
is
amazing; I'm just sad I couldn't take a picture.
Back
to Starbucks, Sarah and I met up and went on to tour the outside of
the palace, the surrounding gardens and we walked to the bridge
spanning the nearby river. Finally, we
ended up at Príncipe
Pío,
an
old train station turned shopping mall. We decided to call it and
head back for dinner, so we grabbed the Metro and went to our
hostels. There was STILL nobody home at mine; I had no idea where
André was, so Sarah and I met up for tapas, combing La
Latina district, which I had heard had pretty good tapas. Sad to
say, but on cold weekdays during off-season,
most of the restaurants were closed or empty. We ended up at an
Indian restaurant across from Sarah's hostel which looked good. This
whole time, we talked about the anxiety
of solo travel. Evidently, Sarah's hostel was also empty. The
loneliness is just something that you have to learn to deal with on
a
long a trip; I wish I was a little better at it, but it takes
practice.
At
this point, I also decided to take an earlier train to Toledo along
with Sarah, since I was done with Madrid. I truly feel like
Barcelona is more interesting. There's nothing wrong with Madrid;
it's a nice, clean city with several great attractions and
neighborhoods. I'd just say that if you have to choose between
spending 2-3 days here vs. 2-3 in Barcelona, Barcelona deserves 3
while Madrid deserves 2. I changed my train ticket (thank God for my
Renfe Spain Pass) while chatting with André once I got back to the
hostel. As usual, it got way too late and I ran out of time to do
anything else (like write hehe) so I decided to just go to sleep.
Little
did I know what would happen the next day...
-
Mateo
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