Best Western Madrid

... Puerta del Sol. But we settled for a tiny rather seedy bar, close to El Rastro, where the owner kept cooking them as long as anyone wanted to eat. The hot chocolate was very rich and the churros were delicious, and we stayed long enough to fill up. We might try the San Gines sometime too.

After churros and chocolate we moved back to browsing through the goods on offer at El Rastro along with half the population of Madrid.

... phone number and email address in case I need anything while I´m in Spain.

My train got in to the Chamartin train station, which is north of central Madrid where I wanted to go sightseeing. And once again, it took me a little while to figure out how to get there. It didn´t help that the Tourist Information Office that was supposed to be there was closed. But I figured it out eventually and it was only a 5 minute ride or so to the ...

... out and meet Steph then walked to the Royal Palace. On the way there we passed through Plaza Mayor and it was just as I remembered it from high school. We get to the palace and the line to get in was like 4 blocks long so we just took pictures outside of it. Then we headed to the Prado museum because it's free after 2. We get there only to discover that it is not free. I had no money in Madrid so Cara and I split with Dan and Steph and ...

... mention of the Expulsion, Inquisition, and only cursory mention of more modern tough times in Spanish history, like the Fascist dictatorship of Francisco Franco. To those of you who know my writing, you know that I am far from one to revel in the lachrymose reading of Jewish history (they chased us, they killed us, we survived, let's eat). But not to explain why there's no Jewish history to Madrid seemed more than a simple oversight. My opening anecdote about Spain's Christian rulers ...

... t plan a butt-breaking two-day overland trek back to the most primitive part of the world. The flight back to Mali would be $300 and still commit me to an unchangeable Air France flight back to Europe, or I could just pay $500 and catch a flight to Europe immediately, booked and paid online from the privacy of my own computer, and then take it from there, Europe, next day. So I did. Like the old saying goes, "better Expedia ...

Dorothy was right - there's no place like home. Home is where you feel happy. Where you feel comfortable. Where you feel safe and secure. Home is where you feel you belong, where your life, to you at least, makes some sort of sense. My home is Perth, Australia, but thats more of a default home due to family. Don't get me wrong, I dig Perth, but my spiritual home it ain't. That mantle belongs to one city - Madrid. It dominates. I came to ...

... goblet. It is incredible. Shortly after getting stated in the Prada my stomach starts to growl from hunger and I am reminded that I missed my last airplane meal. By the time we have walked the Prada for a couple hours, I am about ready to pass out. My knees keep buckling as I am walking. I believe this is more a condition related to lack of sleep than lack of food, but the latter certainly could not be helping the ...

... it's worth seeing - you can visit all the cool Royal rooms at the palace - the old phamarcy and the rooms that have the throne and stuff - it was really cool! We passed all the other sights like the Puerta del sol or the square where the bear is - and the Plaza de cibiles - in the evening we fortunately found a great place for dinner it was recommended in one of Tracy's books - seating only 2 times an evening ...

Well I'm currently in Madrid for a stop over. See Reece and I woke up at 6:15am to make sure we weren't late for our 8:20am train because the streets can be a little hard to navigate in Sevilla. UuuuuMmmmm yeah we got there at 7:10am and after attempting to figure out exactly how our train pass worked we almost missed our train. 'Awesome!' We thought to ourselves because we just ...

A couple cheers have to be sent for today....first and most important is to my mom, who turned 50 on May 14th...yah for her...hopefully she doesn´t kill me for posting this, however, I can say that she looks beautiful for her age, and I would be happy to look like her at age 50!!! The second cheers, goes out to Antoni Gaudi, as he was the center of our tourist type day. He had amazing vision in his day. So our first day ...