we made it to madrid with only a slight plane delay by saturday afternoon. we took three different lines of the metro to get to our hostal. (kudos to judith for figuring that out!) i was the only one out of the four who remembered any spanish, so it was pretty interesting for us to figure out what the guy at the front desk of our hostal was saying. we had reserved a private room for four, but it turned out he had a room for four with a private bathroom available, too for a little bit more. it seemed like it took forever to try to understand what he was saying, but we finally got it and agreed on the room with the bathroom.
we spent the afternoon walking around madrid. our hostal was pretty conveniently located, and it wasn’t too terribly cold. we found this awesome bakery that sold pastries for between one and two euros. it was so good, we went every morning!
the grad guys (jeff, tyler, and max) were spending their last night in madrid before heading off to valencia and barcelona, so we made plans to meet them for tapas that night. on our way back to our hostal, we stopped at a grocery store and bought a couple bottles of sangria and little plastic cups to enjoy while getting ready. this turned out to be hilarious, because all of the cups that we bought seemed to have a little slit cut in the bottom, which of course we didn’t notice until catherine had already poured them and started passing them out. sangria all over the floor!
we met the guys at puerto del sol at 8, and it being carnivale, were not disappointed by the people who were dressed up and performing in various squares throughout the city. the guys had copies of famous tour guide rick steves’ suggestion for a tapas tour, so that’s how we started the night.
after that we headed to the museo del jamon (museum of ham). we had passed at least three of these during the day, and had read that they were known for their ‘famously rude service’, so we were a little apprehensive. but we decided since rick steves suggested it, we had to go for it. it was pretty crowded. i pushed my way to the bar and ordered ham sandwiches for the girls before the guys even knew what they wanted. the sandwiches consisted of a long, hard roll with a thin slice of ham and cheese. for only a euro, no one was complaining. it filled us up enough for another glass of sangria ;)
i guess after succeeding at the museum of ham we were feeling really gutsy. we went to a place called oreja de ora, which means the golden ear, which specializes in, you guessed it, pigs’ ears. jeff and tyler were in to split one, so of course we all had to have a taste of it. the boys liked it. i can tell you i am not a fan. luckily we could wash it down with some more sangria.
after that we were ready to sit down, so we ended up at an irish pub (which seems to happen a lot when we go out with max, no matter what city or country we’re in). everyone got drinks and headed downstairs. catherine and i were last to order at the bar. we got newcastles in honor of planning our spring break trip with a stop in newcastle. the bartender carded us! he wouldn’t give us the beers at first and just kept saying i.d. in his spanish accent. we pretended not to know what he was talking about because we couldn’t believe we were getting carded in spain, and he got one of the other bartenders to ask for our passports. it was bizarre! he didn’t ask anyone else! so i encountered my first time being carded at a bar where the drinking age is sixteen!
the next day, we went to the prado museum, where we saw lots of art from our art history classes. we grabbed a quick lunch at this really cool place called ‘leverage’ and then went to retiro park, which was beautiful! it was huge. we saw soccer games going on and some intense roller blading. we walked around until we found the crystal palace, which was gorgeous. some crazy artist was having an exhibit inside, where she balance things on bottles using the shadows to tell the angle of the sun? i think? and she had strings coming from the ceiling to the ground, maybe representing the sun’s rays? there was no explanation… interesting fact- you are not allowed to go into the crystal palace when it’s raining. personally, i think it would be kind of cool.
you could also rent row boats at this place in the park. it was cute to see so many people on the water, especially because it was valentine’s day.
all kelsey wanted for dinner was paella, and we walked all over until we found it. we even sat down at a restaurant ready to order, only for them to tell us they didn’t serve dinner anymore. we ended up at this really cute restaurant. we went in and judith asked one of the waiters if we could still get paella. it was a little, old spanish man and he yelled out ‘quatro chicas! they want paella!’ everyone in the restaurant turned to look at us, and kept looking at us as we sat down all the way in the back of the restaurant. then our waiter (a different guy) came to take our order and told us they were out of the paella that was their special. we were about to make a scene when he said he could make a different kind and charge us the same price, so we agreed. it was amazing! it had all kinds of crawfish and shrimp and chicken and calamari in it, and we all shared a huge pan.
we wanted to do something special for v-day, so we went to this cute, little bar near our hostel that was serving two for eight euro mojitos. all the tables were full so the four of us sat at the bar, where we met my new friend, bartender pablo. pablo was excited that we were american so he could practice his english on us. he was not impressed with our spanish, though. he told us we needed to practice more. he also kept asking when we’d be back in madrid. he really wanted to hang out with us! we had awesome desserts there. pablo made them extra special with drizzled chocolate and everything.
we watched him make drinks and when i saw him light one on fire, i knew i wanted to try it. it ended up being whiskey and coffee. it was delish! he was pretty upset when we told him we weren’t able to go out with him the next night because we had an early flight. poor pablo! he did give us hugs good bye though.
the next day, we woke up to snow. kelsey and i were not happy. we walked across town to the royal palace where we had to wait in line in the gross snow. it was worth it though. we got a guided tour through all the rooms which was really cool. my favorite room was going through the dining room with a table that could fit over a hundred guests.
after a quick lunch of sandwiches and patatas bravas (mmm!) and a long nap, we headed to the reina sofia museum which has a lot of modern art. this was my favorite stop of the whole trip. the four of us went through the second floor analyzing what picasso was thinking when he made paintings, guessing the titles of certain works, and interpreting blobs to be roosters and tennis players.
the highlight of the visit, though, was seeing the bauhaus exhibit. this probably sounds pretty lame, but we’ve had to watch multiple really bad educational movies about the bauhaus and they always show the dance choreographed by painter oskar schlemmer with the dancers dressed up in ridiculous shapes and colors. catherine recognized some of his artwork in one of the galleries and i thought she was going to have a heart attack when we turned the corner to see life size replica’s of the costumes on display. it made our day! (we’re archidorks, we know)
we found an awesome place for dinner that had a fixed price menu which included salad, fish, potatoes, veggies, and dessert. it was the perfect way to end our weekend!
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