Sabado y Domingo

Today was a lot of walking: wandering aroud El Rastro Sunday market and taking the metro to the Plaza del Toros and walking back to our neighborhood through Salamanca, and revisiting favorite places one last time before we left.  Capping off the day with an drink outside to celebrate the return of the sun and a pizza dinner.

Pictures from the last two days as follows:

Viernes (Madrid)

Today started with a leisurely downhill jog to the Rio Manzanaraz and briefly across to the Casa de Campo park and a more strenuous uphill return.  By the time we were out the door thoroughly the day it was well into Madrid's lunch hour (1 - 4pm) and we headed to VivaBurger which was perfect for two starving vegetarians.  Afterwards we planned to free stroll the city deciding to head towards parque oeste which we hadn't seen yet - by the time we got there it was raining and we escaped into a sad German restaurant near Plaza de Espana for a couple glasses of wine to wait out the downpour/ heavy snow.  The highlights of the day were dinner at the rhino and the David Bowie tribute band.  Finally, we stopped for Pisco sours at Pasco 41 restaura

nt steps away for our apartment.
   

Buen Retiro, Prado, and Thyssen (Madrid)

We are 3 days behind on posts so this is a quick wrap-up.

We spent the nicest weather day Tuesday strolling around Buen Retiro.

We devoted the majority of Wednesday visiting the Prado Museum. For dinner we went to the Taqueria del Allamillo down the hill from our place for some fish tacos and Chile relleno and generous servings of Margheritas.

Today, the weather was even colder so we went to another art musuem - the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum.  While walking through the halls of paintings we noticed fat snowflakes outside and were happy to be out of the cold.   Brian encouraged me to prioritize which paintings to look at closley to avoid the situation that occurred yesterday at the Prado where we over exerted ourselves from looking at too many paintings.  So after the museum we had energy for wine at nearby Taberna de dolores and a stroll through some new streets and caught sunset from Oriete Plaza on our way home. We finally had a real tapas experience in the LA Latina neighborhood at Lamiak and had a delicious cheese plate for 6 euros - NBD.  Then, we went to the San Miguel Mercado once again this time for 'after dinner drinks' of sangria and vermut and had a long conversation with a native Costa Rican who now lives in Norway with her daughter and is on a Spanish vacation that we are jealous of.  Also, pastries were purchased.

- Amanda

Back to Spain (Madrid)

70 degree sunshine and a friendly Turkish-Spanish host welcomed us to our apartment in the Royal Madrid neighborhood.

Along with a posse of 10 children who spent over an hour gleefully running in circles outside our window.

After unpacking we went to the Royal Residence, around the corner from our apartment. Unfortunately, we were definitely not waiting in that line...

So instead, we spent a bit of time walking around our neighborhood, including Plaza Mayor, Plaza de Oriente, Plaza Espana, and the Jardines de Sabintini.

Before finally settling into the 100 year old El Anciano Rey de los Vines for tapas, wine and their famous vino dulce de la casa, with views of the Royal Palace and, unexpectedly, a teenage street fight that made its way to the terrace.

And for good measure we got ano April Spritz nightcap at Mercado de San Miguel, a modern market with stalls of tapas, beer, wine, coffee and dessert where you can stroll with your drink while snacking on $1-2 tapas.