A Bear and a Strawberry Tree (Madrid)

So we caught the overnight train from Lisbon across the border to the geographical centre and capital of Spain, Madrid. After the previously mentioned (almost) pickpocketing incident in the train station we dropped off our backpacks at our hostel near the centre of town and despite the fact that the weather had not improved much on Portugal we made our way down to the Plaza Mayor (main square). But catching overnight trains is not at all a glamourous or even comfortable way of travelling so we found a cafe for some desperately needed caffeine and use of the facilities. We found a really cool cafe called Cafe Corner with some funky artworks on the walls and ceilings right near one of the entrances to the Plaza Mayor.


After our coffees we made our way into the main square. It was still early, and because of the weather, it wasn't too busy. They had stamp markets along the sides where philatelists could indulge in their hobby. This is Tam in the middle of the square with the famous Casa de la Panaderia (Bakery) building with its elaborately painted facade in the background.


Some of the paintings are decidely raunchy.


This is one of the best things in Madrid - the Museo del Jamon (Museum of Ham).

Its not actually a museum, or even a casino (like England there are pokie machines in many places where we normally would not see them) but a cool deli/cafe/bakery spot which is not too expensive. Spain is famous for their love of ham (especially of the serrano and iberico type - note the ham legs in the window above the door) and we happily ate like the locals, which meant many meals consisted of bread (usually a baguette), some slices of ham or chorizo or other sausage, some olive oil (where available) and some cheese (where available). We almost even witnessed a bit of biff between two of the waiters (one young, one old). Very exciting and fiery stuff. One of the younger, larger waitresses threw herself on the younger one to stop him from beating up the older guy but he threw her aside like a rag doll. The other waiters and some customers eventually succeeded in calming him down enough to storm back into the kitchen whilst some other people dragged the old guy out into the street and away.

Afterwards, we ventured onwards for some more sightseeing. We found a statue of a bear nuzzling a strawberry tree (called el oso y el madroño) at the Puerta del Sol.

As earlier reported by Tina, this is the official symbol of Madrid.

Cool looking buildings along the Gran Via.




The Fuente de la Cibeles (Cibeles Fountain) with the cathedral-like Palacio de Comunicaciones (Communications Palace).


We then made our way to one of Madrid's many train stations (as opposed to the underground Metro system stations) but found ourselves in a hot, stinky, humid jungle. Can you see the turtles? This is actually the Madrid Atocha train station. There are almost as many turtles as there are pickpockets. You can't completely lose yourself and enjoy yourself anywhere in Spain. You always feel like you need to be on your guard. Maybe it was the Lonely Planet's warnings or the incident at the train station when we arrived, but it helped us later on in Barcelona as well.


Being a Sunday, admission to the world famous Museo Nacional del Prado (Prado Museum) was free and we, like the many hundreds of other people in Madrid that day, lined up to get in out of the rain to enjoy some high culture. We got to see some really cool paintings by Rembrandt, Rubens, El Greco, Velázquez, and Goya. But what we really liked the best was the triptych "The Garden of Earthly Delights" by Hyeronymus Bosch (aka El Bosco). It's a sort of early Surrealist work with some really wicked ideas. One of the other cool things there were the two paintings by Francisco de Goya called La Maja Desnuda (The Nude Maja) and La Maja Vestida (The Clothed Maja). They are almost identical paintings of the artist's muse, however one has the girl with clothes on, and the other has one with no clothes on. (Tina, did you end up finding your other photos from the inside? We were surprised you could cos we weren't allowed to take any photos!)

They also had this cool exhibition called The Hidden Line where they have used infra-red reflectography to see the artist's preparatory work and underdrawings. Normally you just see the final version so its cool to also be able to see how they started and what they planned on doing and what they decided not to include afterwards.

We filled up on culture and found the sun winking through the clouds. Here's Tammy doing her Snow White impression.


They had this building across the road from the Prado with all these figures on the balconies.


The Neptune Fountain in the Plaza Canovas


Feeling some hunger we stopped in a tapas bar called Los Gatos for a refreshing glass of white wine and a some tapas.






We then headed back to our hostel to check-in and have a bit of a rest. We arrived back and discovered that they had overbooked and they had to shift us down to a little apartment on the ground floor. We thought of our experience in Korcula, Croatia and doing cartwheels in our heads. Then we got down there and found it was nothing special and very substandard. So we freshened up a bit before heading out again for some dinner at one of the restaurant/bars at the Plaza Santa Ana.

This is a tortilla (Spanish omelette) and some golden, deep fried squid. The Lonely Planet recommended this place heaping praise upon this squid. Ours was a bit cold and not the taste sensation we hoped for.


Neither was the callos (traditional Madrid stew consisting mostly of tripe) which must have been packed full of MSG as it made us sooo thirsty afterwards.


After dinner and some more sightseeing in the dark and rain we headed back to our apartment and found some puddles on the floor and some upside down rivers running along the ceiling with some waterfalls. We reported this to the hostel guys and they moved us into a six bed dorm. Wasn't too bad as it was just me and Tam in there by ourselves and we would only be there for one night.

Not wanting to miss out on some must do eating in Madrid, we headed out for some churros (think of a deep-fried donut stick) with thick, hot chocolate at this famous churros place (Chocolateria de San Gines) that is open until the wee hours of the morning. Apparently its the place to finish up at after a big night on the drink. Haven't you heard that the Spanish love to partay?


The next day the weather was slightly better and we headed up north to see the National Royal Palace. Did you know that the word "Real" in Spanish means "Royal"? Anyway, we first stopped off at the Temple of Debod, which is an ancient Egyptian sun-worshipping temple that the Spanish have rebuilt in the Parque del Oeste near the Roytal Palace. Why not?


That's the Palacio Real de Madrid (Royal Palace) over there.


And here's the Jardines de Sabatini out the back.


And a view from the front of the Palacio Real.


Then it was almost time to catch our train outta Madrid up to San Sebastian, in the Basque region up the north of Spain. We were only in Madrid for one night (almost two days), but as Madrid is in the middle of the country, and we'd be going all over Spain, we'd be passing through Madrid a couple of times on this trip.

Fantastical Palace in Sintra (Portugal)

However, before we left Portugal for Spain, we also managed to squeeze in a daytrip over to Sintra whilst the sun was out. The skies had cleared up and we caught the train to Sintra (about an hour out of Lisbon). This is the Palacio National de Sintra (National Palace). It's famous for its twin cone-shaped chimneys (one of which you can see in the photo).


Sintra is a small-ish town but it's very touristy as can be seen by the small green tourist train. That's the Castelo dos Mouros (Moorish Castle) on top of the hill. We caught the bus up the hill to visit it, but it didn't seem that interesting so we moved on.


And this is the place that we were there to see - the Palácio da Pena. Its one of the fantastic places that Tina visited that really piqued our interest as it looks like a castle from Mario Bros. We wandered around all over the place like schoolkids. It was just so much fun and so different to all the other palaces and castles we've seen.








View of the Castelo dos Mouros from the Palácio da Pena.


Attempting to cure myself of acrophobia






Cool tiles abound in Portugal. Lots here in Sintra as well.






One of the few photos that "other" people took of us that we liked. Why is that most people suck at taking photos? Lots of people we asked took blurry shots or shots of us and not of what we wanted (e.g. view or object of interest).










This was, without doubt, the funnest and most colourful castle/palace ever.

Tarts and Port in Lisbon (Portugal)

The next day we caught the train down to Lisbon where the weather was pretty much the same.

This is the main square, the Praça Dom Pedro IV aka Rossio, with some flower stalls. Still early yet as there's not that many people out.


This is one of the main shopping streets, the busy Rua Augusta in central Lisbon, which leads on to the Arco Do Triunfo. It's packed with shops and heaps of touristy restaurants.


Later on we caught the train out of town to visit Belem, home to the best pasteis de nata (portuguese egg tarts) in the world. But first, we decided on some more sightseeing out that way to build up some hunger. First off was the Torre de Belém, as it was the furthest away.


Then we visited the Padrão dos Descobrimentos (Monument of the Discoveries). This is a photo of it (on the left) with the Ponte 25 de Abril.


We finally made our way back to Belem for some tarts. The place to go is Café Pastéis de Belém, which apparently make about 14,000 of the little delights everyday. They were tasty as and we ate two there each, and bought five for the road, one of which didn't make it far outside the shop.

The next day the weather had cleared up a little bit, and after some brilliant (yet very inexpensive coffees) we took a ride up the Elevador de Santa Justa, which gives you access to some pretty decent views of the city.




This is some ruins of the Convento do Carmo near the elevator.


After making our way back down to ground level the sun started to come out! This is at the Praça dos Restauradores (Restorer's Square). Note the cool tiling on the ground. That stuff's all over Portugal.


We then caught an old tram up the hill to visit the Castle of São Jorge and check out Lisbon Cathedral. Whilst waiting for the tram we saw a group of people who were obviously from China, although they were not tourists. They were all carrying boxes and loading up vans. Our guess was that they were buying up all the new fashion so that they can reproduce them back home.

And here we are at the gates to the castle. Can you see the little old man with his head poking out the window? Not sure why he's there or who he is, but he smiles and waves at people when you enter.


Not even November yet and they're getting ready for Xmas. Sadly, they hadn't connected up the electricity yet.


We checked out the trendy shops on the other side of town before venturing off the see what kind of fado (traditional type of music native to Lisbon) joints they have there and if it seemed worth it to check out a performance. We had two 'traditional' places near our hostel but everywhere seemed expensive.


In the end we decided that it was a bit too much to spend and we had lots of other things we'd be needing to spend money on for our trip. Then we returned to the Praça do Comércio for some Portuguese chicken. That's the Castle of São Jorge on top of the hill.


The Santa Justa Elevator


An old tram


This is the Arco Do Triunfo. We snapped this photo just before we left for the overnight train to Madrid.