Among the roses

We had planned to spend the morning looking at modern art at the Reina Sofia. Somehow nether of us could face it. We decided to forgo the pleasure and to seek some green space to calm our home sickness. Rather than the obvious Retiro, we headed for the Parque del Oeste.

The Temple of Debod, donated by Egypt to Spain before it got flooded by the Aswan, was unfortunately closed.

It sits overlooking the Casa Campo

We wandered around, enjoying the trees and calm and found ourselves in the rose garden. well past it's spring prime but still some lovely flowers. It was good for us to be wandering among the roses, so we spent a bit of time doing so.

We eventually had had enough, bought some picnic makings and headed for the Campo Del Moro. Named after an event in the 11th century....names stick.

Again we enjoyed the peace....

and the gardeners riding around in carriages....

we found a picnic spot and lunched...

followed by more trees...

Finally we left the way we had come and walked up to the more formal Sabatini gardens.

and managed to catch the end of a changing of the guard....

Later we met Marga and Pablo for chocolate and churros. They took us to the top of the Corte Ingles where you get  a view of the city. Lovely way to finish our last full day in Madrid.

Travel day tomorrow, probably a goodbye for now.

Making a pig's ear of it

So Madrid woke, or rather we woke as Madrid never sleeps, to a clear bright morning.

We woke a little later than normal as I was a bit under the weather after watching Spain lose to England.

Eventually though we got underway and headed out to look over Madrid. The light was lovely, but already a little harsh.

The view from the top of the terrace bar at the Bellas Artes was lovely, even though they charge a mint for coffee.

We then wandered down and had a look at the revamped Correos building. The old post office has been done up as a free exhibition space with restaurants and bars. We paid more shekels to go to the top tower and get some more views of Madrid. All the way to the sierra.

Lovely, but we were headed to lunch with Luisa and Vivi, who live a couple of metro stops out of central Madrid. It was a lovely catch up, consisting mostly in demolishing 15 tonnes of food. We lunched at a taurino restaurant (bullfight themed) near Ventas bull fighting stadium. Marjan is certain a group of young men who lunched near us were trainee bullfighters, or at least she would like to believe that.

Let me see if I get this straight : Oreja de Cerdo(Pigs Ear), Jamon Iberico, Ensalada Rusa, Alcachofas, Queso followed by Rabo de Toro for me and Calamares for Marjan. That of course was accompanied by manzanilla to start and a couple of bottles of Spanish Chardy to go on with. When we were asked if we wanted dessert we all thought back to the dreaded after dinner mint and said no.

A walk in the park afterwards was required to make us capable of speech. Kidding aside a lovely meal and a lovely catch up.

We are catching up with another cousin, Marga, tomorrow. Dreading the physiological consequences of today's meal I have planned tomorrow to be merely a quick drink in a bar somewhere.......God only know if we manage to keep it that way. Interestingly I believe I have lost some weight.

A new motto

So another day another family encounter......

Though first we did some shopping.

The street are as chaotic as ever. As abuelo said "if they ever find the treasure they keep digging for half of Madrid will be out of work".

Marjan wanted the Nemo costume........

I said no so she wanted to join the Descalzas but they were closed

....then she wanted a doggie pusher......

we did not know Joel's and Morgan's sizes.....

so we settled for  a calming dog collar for our new, yet to be named member of the family; and some anti-inflammatories for ageing and aching joints.

The trip to Pinto was interesting. At one K from Pinto the train started heading back to Madrid. They sent another one to take us there. Normally they are so good.

A wonderful time was had with Tia Jose, and my cousins. Lots of laughing, many wild stories and the odd tear. At least Marjan was not accused of being a big fat liar today. Even though she said she did not want turron.

On the way home we had a wine and some garlic prawns at La Casa Del Abuelo. followed by another wine and some calamari and prawn croquetas. Tapas are dear these days but as they say.........

a whole new Sanchez motto.......

Villa Del Prado

We woke to a rainy Madrid morning. There were still people about but not quite as crazy. I was not being jostled taking photos, so I took a couple, but keeping rain off the lens was a problem..

Plaza Mayor was still Plaza Mayor

The Spaniards absorb other cultures...Sichuan tapas opposite San Miguel

Marjan found a Madrileño to admire the see through archaeology exhibit with.

The queue at the palace of course was elongating by the second even though opening was an hour away.

and the Sabatini gardens looked to be enjoying the rain.

Our wanderings this morning were towards the bus station at Principe Pio. Two stories of country buses, metro and train converge there. Our bus headed out of the bus station on a dedicated on-ramp to the underground freeway and was out of the centre of town in minutes.

Villa Del Prado was our destination. To visit Mum and Dad's resting place and chat with whatever family was about. Seems only Lidia and family, as the rest had taken the opportunity of a long weekend to flee to parts near and far. Still, we had a lovely catch up with them, ate a huge cocido lunch and had a visit to their farm.

We bussed back watching a most amazing sunset, completely sated both nutritionally an emotionally. I made the mistake of taking the window seat and being completely cramped and immobile all the way back.  The price for the sunset.

The long weekend almost over the streets were just normal buzzing rather than crazy.

Back at our little apartment we were exhausted. Sleep though eluded me whilst a woman somewhere in the building was enjoying herself enormously, for quite a while.

Ahhhhh Madrid.....always something coming at you. No pun intended.

How many people can fit in Madrid?

So we woke and headed out for some breakfast. Had to walk around a while before anywhere was open. Still the coffee was good when we did. The morning was quiet, with the tour groups only just beginning.



Did a bit of a walk and a bit of a shop. SIM cards in Madrid continue to be a challenge. It is the combination of me, SIM and Madrid that always seems to cause problems. This time a system outage and a recalcitrant automated SIM machine caused some stress.

Madrid is looking OK. The program to beautify older city buildings is paying dividends. But they continue to dig up every second street.

Anyway the crowds were getting crazy as the day progressed. It is a long weekend here  and lots of people away, so they managed to get half of Europe to cram in instead. Crazy crowds.

There was a queue to buy lottery tickets at least 300 metres long. Marjan and  I felt like we were driving against the tide the whole way.

We made it to Mingo for lunch. Cider and chicken of course. Why else go to Mingo? It was a chance to catch up with aunts and cousins. Paqui reminded us of Dad so much with her cheekiness.

The walk back was exhausting, they had added half the population of the Americas (both) to the streets and it was a slow single file crawl all the while. We are exhausted and are having an evening in.

Arrivederci Sicilia

So a travel day.

We started by taking out the rubbish from our accommodation, 6k into Cefalu. So some explanation for the rubbish everywhere.

We had a leisurely morning, repacking and tidying up. Then off we headed. Driving around Palermo, ring road, was an experience. One that confirmed my decision NOT to drive into Palermo.  We went to a shopping centre for lunch. Very Sicilian, two gelati shops, but some good stuff like a phone charging spot. Managed to NOT eat at the Burger King. Then managed to fill up the car and get it to the airport with a minimum of fuss. Well a little, we missed a turn and ended up running by a road alongside the highway for about 7K. All good though.

Marjan finally breathed after we handed the car keys back. She looks like a new woman....or like an old woman with a new lease of life....or.....well you know what I mean.

Arrivederci Sicilia

Two planes later we arrived in Madrid. Bags out in 15 minutes. 100 meter taxi queue that was managed so well we got in a taxi n 5. As we drove n Marjan note that unlike Sicily there is order. It is not third world.

Into our apartment before midnight. Good night!

A town that has it's merda together

So we decided to not be total slugs today.......particularly because the weather was partially overcast after a lovely sunset yesterday.

So after breakfast and a post breakfast lounge we headed up to Castelbuono. We had heard there were yummy foods to be had.

Well we had to stop short of the actual town as a market was on and the street we had planned to park on was wall to wall stalls for a kilometre or so. They were selling everything, clothes, shoes, food, kitchen stuff. It was a happening street.

We had heard that Castelbuono had an interesting approach to the rubbish problem. They have donkeys wandering about with panniers that get filled by the men manning them. We watched with some interest as a bloke tried parking in a spot partially occupied by a rubbish donkey. He was laughingly calling for assistance when a donkey man told him to push off and leave the donkey be.

We, surprise...surprise, wandered around the town and eventually made it to a lovely square. The sun was shining, the tourists were spending, the chickens were tin and the old men were congregated. Interestingly the men were congregated at three separate 'clubs' . One did not have a name, the other was the Music Appreciation Circle, and the third, a Catholic Gentleman's Association. Still, they just watched the tourists spend money at the fancy pasticceria/caffee, which we did not disappoint them in. It was the world famous Fiasconaro and we bought some manna stuff as well as some cannolli.

Back up to the castle, which gives the town it's name. The place is not really a castle but a rich man's house, though it started as a tower on the top of a hill in the 13th century. In the 1920s it was purchased by the town council with some rate payers helping out. It is now a museum/art gallery.

The Sant'Anna chapel was very interesting, and we were glad the skull was not on display.

Anyway we dropped into another church, 15th century and quite Byzantine. Chiesa Matrice Vecchia

Then it was time for lunch.....a very ante pasta, followed by pork. Chops with wild mushrooms for me, loin with pistachio and manna crust for Marjan.  Lovely old place and a beautiful meal.

We finished off with our last Sicilan ice cream near Torre dell'Orologio and that was us for the day. A walk back to the car, discussing how this town has got itself organised. No rubbish on the streets, yay donkeys! The blokes hanging around are older and associated with clubs, the council owns several of the tourist attractions, they have a water dispensing machine for everybody so they don't have to buy bottled and finally as we walked out three blokes and a truck tidying up after the market.......No merda in Castelbuono.