Christmas Break Part 3 - Madrid

  Madrid, Spain and Canary Islands
Sunday, January 11, 2009

I'm going to go ahead and say that Madrid is not my favorite place in the world. Not even close. Madrid had several things going against it:
1. We had high hopes for Madrid
2. We were there during the 3 kings celebrations (el dia de los reyes)
3. The people in Madrid are amongst the rudest in the world!

With that wonderful introduction, here we go ...
We left Malaga super early in the morning in a torrential rain storm. We took the high speed train to Madrid (which is awesome, I might add), and got there in the middle of the afternoon. Sarah's friend Melinda headed, or was supposed to head, back to the US, so it was just the 3 of us. We found our 'hotel' with few problems and decided to push ourselves to see as much as we could, even though we were really tired. This is about the time Erin realized that she left one of her bags on the train. So, we headed back to the train station to see if we could find it. After 5 different "customer service" desks we finally found them. We headed back to the 'hotel' to drop it off and then we were on our way.
Our first stop was the Museo de Reina Sofia, where Picasso's famous painting "Guernica" is housed. The museum is free on Saturdays (right in our price range), so it was REALLY crowded. We waited in line to get into the museum for about 20 minutes. We headed straight to Guernica to make sure we got to see it. We nudged our way through the crowd that surrounded it. It is ENORMOUS and is really a sight to see! We perused the rest of the art as well, and then went walking around.

Line into Reina Sofia

We walked for.ev.er! We had to stop for sustenance ... there weren't many restaurants near where we were so we decided hot chocolate and pasteles were the best choice ;) Then, we went all through the streets leading to Plaza Mayor, the Plaza, and several other unintentional street as well.

Hot Chocolate and Pasteles

Three of Us in Plaza Mayor

Earlier in the day we had decided to see a flamenco show that our travel book suggested, so we decided to go find the theater. This was no small undertaking, because it was tucked away in a small building. The show was absolutely amazing! I'd say flamenco is a bizarre mix of ball room dancing and tap. Our dancers were fabulous, though, and put on a great show! By the end of the show, it was well past our bed time. We made a deal that there would be no getting up before noon the next day.

Flamenco

More Flamenco

So we slept, slept, and slept. Apparently we really needed it. It turned out to work in our favor, because it was Sunday and just about everything was closed. We really didn't do anything ... it was great!
Much to our surprise, everything was also closed on Monday ... after all it was the day before el dia de los reyes, who DOESN'T know that everything is closed! A little info about el dia de los reyes ... In Spain, they don't really celebrate Christmas like we do in the US. They get small presents on December 25th that come from a log (back in the day, it was Christmas enough if you had a log to burn in order to keep your house warm). So, the 3 kings come on January 6th and bring the kids their full-blown Christmas. The day before 3 kings day, they have an huge parade and celebration, so they can spend the following day w/ friends and family.
So, not really knowing that everything would be closed, we headed to the Palace. However, it was closed ... LAME.

Our sentiments about the Palace beeing closed

Closed Palace

The Cathedral across from the Palace was open, though (a Cathedral ... just my style ;). We were able to go into the Cathedral and to the top to look out across the city. Their was also a little museum w/ a bunch of old, fancy church stuff. The church itself was really beautiful too.

Church Dome

Alter

We have made a habit of naming the statues we see, and although it may have been inappropriate b/c they are saints, etc., we did it anyway (we have to entertain ourselves somehow). Meet Jonas the baby smacker and Tomas de 3 puntos

Jonas the baby smacker

Tomas de 3 puntos

After we ate lunch and rested a bit, we headed out to find the huge parade we had heard so much about. We had just missed it where we were planning to go to watch, but everyone in the city was heading somewhere else ... so we followed them. Outside of one of the major government buildings, there was a huge group of people. A few minutes later, a show started. Their were acrobats and all kinds of dancers and other performers. The parade came by this area as well ... the 3 kings were pretty funny. One of them is actually our Santa and another is supposed to be a black guy, but is really just a white guy painted black.

Crowd for the Festivities

Festivities

We enjoyed the festivities. On the way back to our 'hostel' we saw our second Palestinian protest of the trip. We packed up our stuff and prepared to leave for Barcelona the next day!

Second Palestinian Protest

Scary Hostel