A Weekend in Madrid
 

I spent this past weekend in Madrid and I thought I'd share with you this beautiful city. It is not the most spectacular city in all of Europe, but it does have a lot of architectural beauty.

My hotel was on the Gran Via (one of the main avenues of Madrid for shopping, eating out and theatres), so here are some of that road:

The builidings in Madrid are very well taken care of generally, and some are quite spectacular. All around town there are turrets on buildings. It's like a competition to see who has the best one!

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/granvia3.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/granvia2.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/granvia1.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/granvia4.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/granvia5.jpg

The last one is of the beautiful Metropolis building, also on the Gran Via, by night:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...metropolis.jpg

This is the Plaza Mayor, in the old quarter of Madrid:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...plazamayor.jpg

This is one of the more interesting buildings in the Plaza, because of the murals painted on it:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...eriapmayor.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...apanaderia.jpg

This is a road off the Plaza Mayor, and in the distance is the Catedral de San Isidro:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...plazamayor.jpg

Close-up of the Catedral:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...lsanisidro.jpg

I visited a couple of museums in Madrid. Culturally Madrid is a thriving city, the people take a great interest in the arts.

This is the Reina Sofia, where I went to see the fascinating art show "Máquinas&Almas'

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...reinasofia.jpg

This is the Thyssen-Bournemiszya Museum, home to one of the best art collections Europe has to offer:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...er/thyssen.jpg

And the gardens of this museum:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...ssengarden.jpg

Unfortunately neither museum allowed any photos, but I will be posting what I could find on the Reina Sofia show elsewhere on the boards.

On my 2nd day in Madrid I visited a traditional market called El Rastro:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70.../elrastro1.jpg

This stall caught my eye:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...asticstand.jpg

In the afternoon I walked around town a fair bit and took some shots.

The town hall:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...untamiento.jpg

Calle Arenal (pedestrian street)

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...allearenal.jpg

Some buildings are full of character. Take a look at this pharmacy:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/pharmacy.jpg

Calle Mayor

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...callemayor.jpg

There was some nice attention to detail, and many streets had these cute plaques indicating their names:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...ayorplaque.jpg

Street leading up to Plaza Mayor with some strange curved buildings!

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...plazamayor.jpg

Torre de Madrid, which was once the tallest building in Madrid:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...redemadrid.jpg

Fountain in Plaza de España:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...lazaespana.jpg

In Calle Mayor I had lunch that day in a restaurant called Casa Ciriaco, which is renowned for its tapas and it's a very traditional type of place for Madrid. Though service was very friendly, the food was just ok.

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...asaciriaco.jpg

I liked the restaurant's own symbol (back of a chair - was also on the plates!):

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...iacosymbol.jpg

I also saw the opera house and the royal palace:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...pler/opera.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...alacioreal.jpg

Finally, here are some shots of the alien-spaceship-like airport:

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/barajas1.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/barajas2.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/barajas3.jpg

It was a busy two days but well worth it!

There are no photos of me but my excuse is that I was alone so didn't remember...:p

So beautiful! My favorite is your photograph of the cathedral. I made it my desktop image so I can enjoy it throughout the day.

Fascinating. Thanks for the trip :D

The buildings and architecture are much like I expected (reminds me a LOT of Cali, Colombia), but the city looks so much cleaner than I'd envisioned. Just beautiful.

What was that at the market? They looked like rubber bands but maybe they're ribbons? Oh and I loved the restaurant's coat of arms :lol:

Nice pictures lil Tip. Glad you had a great trip. I'm gonna check out your blog later too.

One thing, you forgot the most important thing in the pictures: Where are you?

LT... thanks for the great shot. It's been a few years since my last visit to Madrid. I loved it there and hope to go back some day soon.

Did you get to eat any Chocolate con Churros or some of the very excellent hams?

I miss Madrid!

Thanks for all the positive comments guys.

I had plenty of jamón in fact! Also did eat chocolate con churros, it was decadent.

Madrid is cool, I get to go there for work once a year so I don't have time to miss it. Plus when you live somewhere awesome like Lisbon, what's to miss? :p Well if I had to miss anywhere in Spain, Barcelona I'd miss far more than Madrid.

I'm not in the pics because...I only took pics of myself and a couple where I asked strangers to do it and they are not particularly fascinating heh. Think of it this way, since I'm not in the pics it leaves room for you to envisage yourself in the places I was in.

Madrid certainly is clean in the main areas and generally too. In some areas of the city, the home owners pay the town a yearly amount to keep their buildings clean. So that explains some of it. I wish they did that here, Lisbon buildings aren't nearly as bright. They are colourful though! Which reminds me I must post a tour of Lisbon sometime...

One thing I do notice about Madrid is that all the shops, when closed, have these metal doors that get closed over the window of the store. This makes them a prime spot for graffiti artists, and not the good kind. So a lot of the Madrid back streets look nasty because of that. You don't really get that here. It's strange because some are so badly vandalized that you wonder is the store closed for the day or permanently? Strange! Some stores look quite shoddy.

The stall at the market was selling all kinds of rubber bands and just sheets of rubber...I did consider buying a couple of sheets and seeing what I could make with those! But I'll be back in February and I might go there again so we'll see...I'll be sure to show you if I do end up using the stuff :)

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y70...r/granvia4.jpg


Fire escape?

Fire escape for Mensa members?

Tippler, these are freaking awesome pictures. :thumbsup: Thanks so much for sharing them!! I MUST get myself to Madrid next time I'm in Spain... I've always been to Spain in July, when the temperature makes it impossible to go there (or any further south). You have given me plenty of good reasons to make it a priority. :)
My first thought was actually "it's an artistic depiction of an orgy" ... but that's my sick mind at work, hahaha. :)

wow! just wow!

love the pics. seems theres a lot to do in madrid! lots of vibrant colours and plenty of architectural buildings. truely a photographers playground.

i couldnt make out of those were rubber bands or pasta!

my fav pic is the metropolis building. the curved building - it curved on a horizontal plane, but does it curve on the vertical plane too? or is that just my eyes playing tricks?