Spain Day 2 – Madrid’s Sights

*Please note I wrote this while traveling a few weeks ago on February 16th, 2013

I woke up this morning in Madrid, Spain with the warm sun streaming in the window. I had a comfy sleep at my cousins apartment which is located in the suburbs of the city, kind of like Yonge and Eglington in relation to downtown Toronto.

After a nice breakfast of toast, cream cheese, black currant jam and a tangerine, Todd, Belen, their daughter and I made our way downtown to see some sights. It was just after 12 when we got downtown and we went straight to begin our day at the famous Plaza Mayor.

The Plaza Mayor was built in 1619 and is a historic cobbled square and traffic free chunk of 17th century Spain. Each side of the square is uniform looking. The equestrian statue in the middle of the square is of Philip III who ordered the squares construction. This site originally served as a theater stage center. Lots of Spanish history played on this stage, from bull fights, royal pageantry to hangings and burnings from the gruesome inquisition. Now a days it’s a place for tourists, coin and stamp collectors to come on the weekend and for many interesting buskers. One busker was dressed as mickey mouse, another dressed to make it look like they didn’t have a head and instead just a floating hat (this was very well done by the way), another was dressed as a sparkling goat. One particularly creepy busker was dressed as a baby in a stroller but with a man sized head and he was talking in a strange high pitch baby voice, it was so creepy I didn’t take a photo of him, I’d prefer not to remember that image.

From Plaza Mayor we walked to a small local restaurant called El Mollete. The restaurant was so petite there were only 4-5 tables in the place. There we ate like the locals, we had a tapas style meal of Gorgonzola cheese croquettes, tomatoes and tuna in oil, artichoke hearts boiled in an oil sauce with spices, “broken eggs” which is fried eggs on top of french fries and then cut up to let the egg yolks soak into the fries. We also had another dish of fries in oil only with Iberian pork which is called “secret”. I had a glass of delicious Spanish red wine to wash it all down. It was a wonderful lunch.

Once our bellies were full we walked to the Palacio Real (the royal palace) where I left my cousin’s so they could take their daughter home for a nap and I went for a tour through the palace. You are not allowed to take any photos inside the palace, which is such a shame because each room is completely unique and not like the next. However I did snag a picture of the interior of the main lobby. I respected the rules and I kept the rest of my photo taking to the exterior of the palace.

The Palacio Real was commissioned by Philip V in the 17th century. There are more than 2000 rooms with lots of luxurious tapestries, enormous beautiful chandeliers and priceless porcelain. There are 24 rooms on the first floor of the palace that are open for tourists to wander through and daydream. The royal family lives in a mansion a few miles away but the place still functions as a royal palace and is used for formal functions, state receptions and royal weddings. I thoroughly enjoyed wandering through the palace and seeing the room entirely decorated in porcelain, the billiards room with all the wood wainscoting and I just loved the chandeliers in every room.

After the tour I met up with my cousin and we walked to Puerto del Sol, Madrid’s lively central square. It’s a mostly pedestrianized, wide open and cement filled tourist space. It functions as the central hub for the Metro (subway) system, it has many shops and is a common place for public demonstrations and protests. We also found the popular statue of the bear eating from a tree. This is a popular symbol of Madrid. After taking some photos we walked a little loop around Sol and then walked to the right of Puerto due Sol to a place called Plaza De Canaleias where I could see some of the surrounding area and I took photos of interesting buildings. We then returned to Puerto de Sol and took the metro to Cuzco stn, then we walked to the Eurobuilding 2 where the “meet and greet” for the Vaughan Town program was. My cousin left to go home and I went inside, excited to meet my fellow Anglo volunteers.

The meet and greet was in a little bar under a hotel in Eurobuilding 2. There were lots of people, maybe 30-40 and two tables. I got a sticker with my name on it and introduced myself to a table with a few empty seats. There was another table in the room with people who were quite involved in their conversations so I didn’t want to interrupt. After some good “get to know you ” conversations I learned that the very interesting people I had just met were actually going to a different location than mine. Whoops! I was at the wrong table and hadn’t noticed the location of the program on my name tag sticker. So I moved to the other table and introduced myself there. They were pretty nice and I was happy to learn that a few of the people had taken the program before. They seemed like an interesting bunch and I looked forward to getting to know them in the program.

After the “meet and greet” I walked back to Todd’s place, about a 30 min walk, where I met with my cousin and his family to relax and have dinner. I got a chance to Google Talk with my husband, which was great because I really miss him. Then we had dinner, corn, tomatoes and onion salad, with home made French fries and veal cutlets breaded with sesame seeds with fresh lemon squeezed on top, it was delicious! Belen is an excellent cook.

It’s now 1am here and I have to get up in 6 hours to catch my bus to Gredos, so I am off to bed. Goodnight Madrid!