After a short layover in Brussels, we landed in Madrid and took the Metro train at rush hour to Sol, the central neighborhood where we would be staying. A tourist kiosk furnished us with a helpful map of central Madrid that enabled us to navigate the few blocks through relative chaos to our AirBnB and which would come in handy throughout our stay. The elevator there was just big enough to accommodate us both and our bags single file, but the room was utterly charming with a splendid balcony view of the narrow street below.
Yana found us a great nearby tapas bar called Alhambra with perhaps the greatest sangria either of us had ever tasted. The sublimely decadent treat was the Toast of Hopeful Onion with jam and caramelized onions on fried goat cheese.
Our tapas crawl continued with a bang at El Museo de Jamon, a brightly lit chain purveyor of Madrid’s undisputedly most popular meat, Jamon Iberico.
We wandered into El Plaza de Santa Ana where, dwarfed by a giant hotel, we had drinks amid souvenir peddlers trying to sell us some admittedly pretty cool light-up propellers they would shoot into the air with rubber bands and then catch after they spun back to earth.
The next morning we got churros con chocolate por desayuno and set off to Museo Nacional del Prado, one of the largest art museums in Madrid and home to many famous pieces.
Following that we were off for dinner and a truly exceptional flamenco show!
Then we went dancing at an Irish pub with a DJ playing mostly American music from the 80s and 90s and stayed out until about 5 in the morning.
The next afternoon we walked back toward the massive park behind El Prado, El Parque del Buen Retiro, which until the mid-nineteenth century was a royal garden, to have a picnic lunch. Our Rick Steves travel corkscrew collapsed on its maiden voyage, but a combination of Mark’s beer bottle opener and our Rick Steves travel knife saved the day by allowing Mark to repeatedly pry out the cork and then cut the exposed portion away — Yana’s brilliant idea — for more leverage between the corkscrew and the bottle neck.
With our faith in our own ingenuity confirmed anew, we set out to row a boat on the great pond in Retiro, where mock naval battles were staged long ago to entertain the king.
We stayed in the park until after dark and headed back home for dinner, ultimately deciding after considering several other options that a return to Alhambra was the best bet. As luck would have it, the same waiter from two nights before remembered us and put in a good word with our waiter that night, who then treated us to traditional wedding day drinks: a milky coffee drink for Yana and a licorice liqueur for Mark.
The next morning we bid farewell to Madrid and headed to the train station for Valencia. ¡Hasta luego!