Monday, 2 July -
Today was to be one of our 'day-trip' days. I'm not feeling my best, so we are changing our schedule about a little bit. That's the nice thing about building in a few free days.
I have to say that the things we did do today were pretty darn cool.
We went for breakfast, then I was feeling worse so we did a bit of shopping for things to help me feel better and came back to the room. I nappped, Tom napped, Tom tried again to reach KLM. We're trying to ugrade our seats for the return flight but they are making it very difficult. I was going to write up glowing things about them, but now, no!
Okay, Anyway, so we decided to go do some things close to the hotel, we went to parque de españa to see the statue of don quixote, then to the Temple of Debod, the only complete Egyptian monument outside of Egypt, it is over 2000 years old. Then we went to the Teleférico de Madrid. We were too early for the Teleferico so went for a beer, and shared a plate of marinated green beans, and a cooked trout, yummmyyyyyy! The Teleférico is a cable car that crosses a huge park, the railway, the river manzanitas, and offers some awesome views. It's one of my favorite things so far.
Then about 8pm the Championship futbal team was passing by enroute to present the trophy to the King. Now you all know I am no sports fan, but Tom and I stood out there for quite a long time to be able to get photos to share with you.
Tuesday, 3 July -
Today we did one of our scheduled day trips - we went to the Royal Monastary of San Lorenzo de El Escorial. As a tourist attraction it has merit, I'm just a bit blah about it! The size of the place is more than impressive, the grounds and gardens are extensive. The carpentry, stone masonry, and building expertise blows your mind. The frescoes are incredible. It is granduer, it is amazing, I'm glad we went, but I don't need to see it again. The town of Escorial was far ore impressive, reallylovely, built on the mountain so lots of stairways and turns. We had a very good lunch atba hotel restaurant across from a park that if they hadn't built their municipal building there woud have an amazing view out over the expanse towards Madrid. In fact I could see the 4 Towers Business complex from that vantage point.
We took the Metro, then a bus both ways and after we exited the bus and were headed to the store where we now buy our water and bananas we were commenting on how now, just as we're starting to figure our way around we're getting ready to leave.
Tomorrow we pack up and head to Toledo for a night. Then off to either Granada, Seville, or Cordoba. Need to figure out which one would be the best base rather that relocate every night
Tom tried KLM again, no luck! Now we've used the skype and had a long conversation with a friend with no problems, but both times with KLM they've said the signal was bad and they couldn't hear. Hmmmmmm, is it? Or are they just using that as a ploy?....
Any of you out there use Blogger with your ipad that can tell me what I need to do to be able to attach photos???