Madrid

Spain is always a good idea, anyone would agree. Sun, good food and a relaxing atmosphere. Madrid was no exception to that, boy did I have a relaxing time in this city. As you may have read in a previous blog I have visited Barcelona before and I loved it. I had expected Madrid to be a bit more of a big city with a lot of fuss. But nonetheless, this city was even more relaxing than Barcelona! I could not believe it. Yes, Madrid is a big city but somehow the vibe is more calm and the people a very much tranquilo. I love it.

📷📷​​

Yet again we took off from Eindhoven airport with that one low budget airway with the blue and yellow logo; my besties. We landed pretty late but Madrid has such a convenient metro system so we didn’t have to worry about how to get to our hotel. We bought ourselves a metrocard with an amount of 10 rides in total and off we went. It took us about 1hour in total to get to our hotel in the lovely neighborhood La Latina. La Latina is a neighborhood well know for its good food. The area had lots of smaller streets that are worth walking through and to taste some good tapas.

From our hotel it was a short walk towards Plaza Mayor. Plaza Mayor is a central square in Madrid and not far from it there’s another famous square; Puerta del Sol. On our first day we decided to just walk through the city and stop by a few interesting spots. Puerta del Sol is also the radial centre of Spain, so on this square you might find the exact spot that is the centre of Spain. How cool is that?

From Puerto del Sol you can go anywhere. It is nice to stroll down Gran Vía for shopping, I can definitely recommend this. Madrid is so good for shopping, especially for short people like myself because here they have plenty for us! After a long day of shopping we decided to buy ourselves some lunch at the supermarket and head towards the lovely Retiro Park to relax in the sun. El Retiro Park is one of the largest parks in Madrid and it’s quite busy as well. But if you search for it you might find a nice spot to sit down in the grass and enjoy some snacks and a cerveza or dos. A typical tourist activity here would be to rent a small boat and row your way around.

A definit highlight of this first day would be Mercado San Miguel, this was just heaven on earth. This is a covered market with lots of food. It’s all in small portions so you can try all you want without having to eat heaps. It can be pretty full in here so like anywhere beware of you personal belongings since this would be a perfect spot for pickpocketing.

📷📷​​

Our second day we kicked off at Ciento Montaditos for breakfast. This is such a fun place to stop by for a quick bite, you can find these all over the city. The concept is pretty simple, there’s a bunch of small sandwiches to choose from and they’re all priced around 1euro or 1,50euro.

From this spot it was just a few steps left towards the Royal Palace. It’s really hard to miss; so impressive! Like anywhere in Madrid the architecture amazed me. A fun fact about this palace is that it is actually one of Europe’s largest palaces. It is no longer the royal family’s home but it is still their official residence at the city of Madrid and used for state ceremonies.

Next to the Royal Palace there is the Sabatini Gardens which are part of the palace. It is well kept and open to the public since 1978 so it’s definitely worth it to take a walk through here.

From the the palace it is only a short walk towards Templo de Debod. This is a stunning piece of Egypt in the middle of Spain. Templo de Debod was donated from the state of Egypt to Spain in 1968. From Templo de Debod there’s a beautiful view over the royal palace and it’s surroundings. One piece of advice: visit this temple at sunset!

📷​​ 📷

Ofcourse one cannot visit the city of Madrid without visiting the Bernabéu Stadium; the heavenly playgrounds of Real Madrid. We didn’t book anything in advance and we didn’t need to. It was easy to buy our tickets at the counter and we could start the tour immediately. What a massive stadium this is, we we’re lead all the way up to get a good view over the field and then the tour showed us the great legacy of this club. One could say that it’s a well preserved museum.

Overall Madrid has been a very nice surprise. A vibrant yet relaxing city with lots of good food, plenty of sun and enough beautiful things to do and see.