I'd love to complete this blog with as much detailed writing as possible, but sadly the longer I wait to write in here, the more I forget :( so I'll just have to do as best as I can to remember everything.
Day 50:
Good morning Madrid. We started our day off eating in our sweet kitchen and making bomb dot com sandwiches (I miss those so much), We headed out to tour the city with good ol' Rick - saw Puerta del Sol and other old parts of the town. Madrid surely wasn't what I had expected.. it was actually quite the bustling town; nicely decorated buildings made up for their heights. We walked and walked and ended up at Almudena Cathedral. Inside was amazingly huge, and really quite different than any other cathedral I'd ever seen before. Ceilings were colored and sparkly, stained glass was not traditional, and the organ was uniquely beautiful.
Standing in the center of Spain!
Afterwards, we stopped at its neighbor, the Royal Palace. Of course, more amazingness. And not so amazing violinist butchering 'Canon in D' over and over again. It made me a little more excited for what Paris' musical streets had in store for me in the near future.
Lunch in Parque del Retiro. Beeeautiful. Our sandwiches made it ten times more enjoyable.
Of course we also had to visit the Reina Sofia and El Prado museums. So much art-looking and so little time. I was exhausted and eventually Cherilyn and I had to venture off to go walk around and shop in the city. We also stopped by a Mickey D's for a mcflurry.. *guilt*. But it was so worth it! Spain mcflurries come with not only a topping but a syrup too! So an oreo + chocolate mcflurry it was..
That night we decided to have a nicer, real meal as a 'goodbye' to Spain. We tried El Caldero, a restaurant well-known for their paella (and delicious it WAS). It was sooo nice to actually treat our bodies well for a nice sit-down meal for once. We were also treated even better by our old Italian men neighbors and waiter.. photo opps, free liquor desserts, .. and a surprise farewell for Stella :P
Did I mention that before our classy meal, we stopped by 100 Montaditos for €1 caña and mondaditos? Yes, we really did.
Anyway, it was late, but it was our LAST night in Spain. We had to go out! So, off to our favorite little club we went to meet Manuel for free beer/sangria again. David the bartender also gave us shots on the house and lollipops. Mark the DJ actually approached us for our names. We were loved in Madrid, no? Eventually, we met Chileans who we would eventually spend our whole night with. They convinced us to sneak in and follow their bar-hopping group..which led to more free alcohol. So sweet. We ended the night at Kapital, the seven-story club with the awesome fog/wind machine. Our Chilean friends were kind and gentlemen enough to walk us home in the early a.m. and teach us hilarious Chilean phrases (which we put right to use with random passersby)!
"¡Andate a la mierda!" :)
I was sad to have to go to sleep because it'd mean I'd be leaving Spain, wonderful Spain. But in the morning, I'd be off to Paris..
Barajas Airport, Terminal 4. I like.
