Madrid? Hated it. Just a big, dirty city with too much traffic. We did go to the Prado Museum and saw Bosch´s "Garden of Earthly Delights", which was really cool, and there was a special exhibit by Duhrer. Awesome. And our hotel was kick ass. Our first night, Danielle (Hawk´s mom) almost got her purse stolen from a cafe on the Puerto del Sol, but she chased down the thief (who was absolutely dumbfounded that this middle aged American woman was busting ass across the street to run him down). Exciting! We´ve also had a really hard time eating in Spain so far. The Spanish are huge on ham and crazy seafood, and we just aren´t. We had a nice dinner on Wednesday night, since it was Hawk´s 31st birthday (yay baby!), but drank way too much and were completely hung over for our day trip to Toledo.
Toledo is cool, but I´m glad we didn´t spend a couple days there like we originally planned. It was perfect for a day trip. It is a town on top of a hill about an hour outside Madrid, and the architecture hasn´t been updated since the 1700s. Gothic and really beautiful. Did some shopping and sightseeing, then headed back to the city.
We left Madrid this morning and took a flight to Barcelona, and it feels really good to be back here after five years (we were here for three days on our honeymoon). This is an amazing city - beautiful, gothic, charming. It has changed a lot since we were here last - got way fancier, with more stores and upscale cafes. Yummy gelato! We´ve been here an hour and already I have sampled one lemon gelato and am planning my next. We are here till Sunday, then are heading north, to a small town called Figueres, where Salvador Dali built his museum, and then I think we´re going to a tiny beach town called Cadeques.
That´s all for now, so…
Adios!
