Yesterday we woke up ate breakfast at our hotel, Dear Hotel and it was pure bliss. Everything you can ever think on a buffet it was there. We sat there for a couple hours planning out our week because we had just not really done it. The view from the top of the hotel where we were sitting you could see the whole city of Madrid!
We then headed off to the Prado Museum. You're not allowed photos inside, so we put our cameras and jackets in the convenient lockers in the front and went on our way. Embarrassingly we spent over 6 hours there. I just could not contain my excitement for everything they had. Las Meninas by Diego Velázquez, The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch and The Third of May 1808 by Goya were on my top 3 to find and just take in 100% of it. On top of all the other pieces, Goyas, El Grecos, Raphael, the list goes on. I bought the book and will continue my studies when I get back home!
Today we got up early and headed straight to the Caixa Forum but instead of going in we went to get coffee just down the road, there is a corporate looking starbucks style across the street and then there is the most quaint and adorable shop just up the block, Matilda, it housed art from local artists, a mini thrift shop and some just adorable coffee cake that was tapas style when we ordered our espresso and cafe au latte. Then we ant into the Caixa Forum, where they had a Míro exhibit and Drawing Versailles exhibit. Both were amazing. I got a ton of photos of the Míro exhibit that really inspired me big time as an artist in college, so it was amazing to see some of his stuff in person. The Drawing Versailles exhibit pictures weren't allowed but we were beyond fascinated with it all, we probably spent more time in that one!
We then walked across the street to the Real Jardin Botanica and walked around. The gardens were full of greenery from all over the world. It was fun to walk around and just take in the beauty of nature preservation.
We ended up eating lunch a few blocks away at a cute little cuban inspired spanish place. They had zero interest in helping us figure out the menu but we had a lot of fun trying to figure it out and ordering. Frank definitely got the better dish! Not far from the place we ate was a little street market that had musicians and people selling books and art. We walked around and looked at some of our favorite books in Spanish. We walked all the way to Puerta del Sol, another city center where the infamous bear statue which is on the flag of spain and the money was. It was not as grand as we thought it would be.
It was a pretty busy area full of people and major businesses, mostly corporate style businesses so we didn't stay very long. It was also getting pretty late. so we walked around the city to get back to the hotel change and meet my brother for a late night dinner and tapas hop. Which we are clearly getting accustomed to the fact that you order beer and food is also delivered to you. We had tapas and beer both tonight and last night haha.
