Madrid

We got into Madrid late in the evening. We drove around trying to find the soccer stadium because Real Madrid was playing Atletico Madrid. I had to ask many people for directions in Spanish, which was really pretty cool. I remember a lot still, which I am totally impressed by. It makes me wish I was more fluent...at any rate, that first night was so frustrating because we were in the wrong part of the city, we couldn't find any place to eat, didn't have a place to sleep. We almost resigned to sleeping in the car for the night, but luckily found a hostel where we passed out right away.

We woke up early on Sunday and went to El Rastro - the flea market that is open every Sunday. We actually ended up purchasing bomber jackets from there, which I am totally happy with! We ended up finding the palace, and paid to tour that (when I travel, there is something about old churches and castles/palaces that fascinates me!). We ate lunch at a quaint little restaurant next to a used book market. We grabbed a Marid tour bus also...and picke up our bull fighting tickets. The bull fight has its own blog!

After the bull fight, we went to dinner by our hostel at this amazing restaurant with awesome tapas and sangria. I will have to say, I fell in LOVE with Spanish food - it was sooo good.

We spent one more night in Madrid. Got up the next morning, and we caught the tour bus again. At one point, the tour bus stopped for about 20 minutes while the driver took a break, I believe. We were sitting on the upper deck in order to take better pictures. At any rate, we were so exhausted that we both fell asleep on the tour bus.

After having parked our car in the same spot for two days, we were able to find it - and it had no tickets! We got in the car and headed out of the city, only to drive right by the stadium we couldn't find two nights before! We were on the road to Valencia.

Gardens outside the palace.

Security booth outside the palace.

Church outside of the palace.

The palace.

Madrid stadium.

I took this picture too late, but it is a billboard at a movie theater. You can kind of see, but these ads for the movies were all hand-painted. It was sooo cool.

We ate our amazing dinnere here.

Tapas and sangria!

I found an arch in Madrid...outside the bull fighting arena.

Our lunch outside the used book market.

Beautiful parks everywhere!

Again, I love the small, narrow streets!

Illegal pictures taken inside the palace!

This was a statue of a Pope - I can't remember which one though!

I loved the street signs!

El Rastro - the Sunday flea market

Crews come out everyday and clean up the trash and grafitti.