Madrid y Toledo

This weekend I went with five other buddies (April, Michelle, Michael, Alex, and Marjahn) to Madrid. We left Friday night, taking the bus to the airport in Girona and just barely making it to our flight. After arriving in Madrid fairly late, around 10 p.m. or so, we made our way to our hostel. It was my first time staying in a hostel and the one we got was very nice. It was off of Gran Via near the Puerta del Sol. We ended up getting a private room with six beds in it and a sink for 11 euro a night per person. By the time we had gone from the airport to the metro to the hostel and had settled in, it was very late (like midnight) and I was really hungry. Four of the six wanted to go out to a club, but I had been sick all week and my friend April was getting sick, so we didn't go. Instead, we ate dinner at the only restaurant that was open: McDonald's. It was more or less the same as in America, except that I got patatas deluxe instead of fries, which were more like new potatoes that have been quartered and fried with slightly different seasonings. Because we were so hungry it tasted wonderful.

The hostel was very cold, so after a restless night of not sleeping from being freezing and being woken up by amigos borrachos, we got up late and went out to breakfast. We found a place called El Jamonal nearby. I had a really, really good tortilla española (the best I have had so far in Spain) and we once again tried the patatas bravas. They were pan fried potatoes but this time with only the chili sauce, no mayonnaise. Afterwards we set off for the Palacio Real, the royal palace. I had walked around the palace two years ago with Ba and Evelyn, but we had not gone inside. The inside was really incredible. It was more luxe than Versailles even, or maybe just better preserved. 

After that we headed to Parque Retiro, a pretty park with a man made lake and nice architecture. They had row boats available, so we divided into two groups of three and paddled around the lake. It was super fun and also very beautiful, although it was cold. I was a fairly incompetent rower and ended up rowing too near a fountain that streamed water into our boat. 

We were extremely cold and a little wet after our boating adventure ended, so we went to a nearby cafetería (coffee shop) and got a little snack. We then went to the Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid's modern art museum. (I had been to El Prado during my previous two day trip to Madrid.) I saw Picasso's Guernica and a lot of Dalí, including some of his non-surreal paintings, which was interesting. I also saw a lot of Miró and other Spanish artists. We didn't get to stay as long as I would have liked because it was closing. We then went back to the hostel and changed for dinner. Cake at the bakery:

We found a small restaurant nearby where we shared some tapas and wine. We had sautéed mushrooms, ham croquettes (very good), mini hamburguesas with arugula and a puréed tomato sauce (also good), and bread with tomato and garlic. We went back to the hostel for a little while after and met some friends of Marjahn's who were studying in Madrid for this semester. Then we went to Joy, where we were supposed to get in free because we knew a promoter through a friend at CIEE, Patty. Although the girls got in free, the boys still had to pay 15 euro. On top of that, April forgot her ID and had to go home, then pay 15 euro when she came back with the boys. I did not really care for the club. The dance floor was small and it was really smoky. The worst thing though was the crowd. It was over 50% old people, as in people in their forties or late thirties. There was even a really old guy who was bald with white hair! I was really surprised. 

The smoke made my throat hurt a lot, so I was ready to leave by about 3:30. I went home with Michelle and April, but of course we were woken up when the same amigos borrachos came in at six. We slept for a bit longer, then checked out the next morning. After breakfast of churros and gofres (waffles), we went to the train station to head for Toledo. It was about 30 minutes on the train. 

Toledo was beautiful and we got lucky because it had stopped raining. (It rained a little that morning in Madrid.) It is a medieval town and all the buildings are old and the streets and narrow and twisty-turny. We tried to go to the Alcázar, a fortress thing, but it was closed. We then went to the Cathedral, which was beautiful but cost 7 euro. By this time we were all very low on money and we did not go in. We then wandered, and Alex, April, Michelle and I stumbled upon a little park on top of a hill. It was incredibly windy but the views of the town, the river, the countryside, and the mountains was great. The picture below is from a different lookout point but it has a castle in it, and the sky was a little El Greco-ish. 

We met back up with the others at a small chapel called Santo Tomé, in which lies one of El Greco's most famous paintings, the Burial of Count Orgaz. El Greco is one of my favorite Spanish artists and it was a treat to get to see this painting. It is really well preserved for being from the 1500s. The chapel itself was fun to walk through as well, although they had a bunch of anti-abortion posters. Actual El Greco View of Toledo:

Afterwards we headed to a cafe and had pasta dinner, then headed back to Madrid on the train. Once in Madrid we just went straight to the train station from which we would catch the train back to Barcelona. It was a very fun train ride. We had our own car, although it had seats and not bunks. We brought with us some bread, wine, cheese, olive oil and salchicha and had snacks. I slept for the second half of the nearly 10 hour ride. We got back to Barcelona before 8 and I headed for home.