Madrid
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| Madrid |
My good buddy Michael
Manove has been on sabbatical in Madrid this past year, so it seemed like the
perfect opportunity for me to visit Spain. Fellow MFA Guide Carol Fishman joined
me on a whirlwind tour through Madrid, Andalucia, and Barcelona. So much to see,
and only 2 weeks to see it all… I’m going to run out of superlatives, as I
really fell in love with just about every place we visited.
Madrid is indeed
beautiful, with lovely squares, fountains and parks at almost every
intersection. The buildings are colorful and elegant, often with exquisite
wrought-iron balconies or elaborate sculptural detail. It’s clean; has a very
efficient metro system (inexpensive if you buy a 10-trip ticket); is full of
museums, palaces and churches that are open until 8:00 or 9:00 pm (though with
the churches in particular, one has to beware of long mid-day closings); has
incredible restaurants; and is a party town. Early evening is the time for
drinks and tapas, followed by dinner at 9:30 at the earliest. The streets and
outdoor cafes are thronged until the wee hours of the morning -- it almost
killed even a nightowl like me!
A city sure is a whole
lot more fun when one knows someone there. Michael and his wife Elvira ensured
our social life was a busy one, planning delicious dinners for us almost every
night with his friends and colleagues. Restaurants I can highly recommend
include Kulto al Plato (very creative
tapas); Café de Asturias (a small sidreria –i.e. serves hard cider -- in the
edgy, young and bustling Lavapies neighborhood); La
Buganvilla (fabulous paella and fidegua) ; a nameless tapas restaurant on
Santa Ana Square (address is #10); El Alambique (a hole-in-the-wall Carol and I
stumbled on at Calle Fúcar 7 with astoundingly good food); and In Situ. We drank many bottles of fine
Spanish wine and feasted on white anchovies, pork cheeks, paella, seviche, a
wide variety of hams, tuna belly, gazpacho in many forms, etc. etc.-- usually
finished off by a complimentary chupito of a yummy mysterious plum (?)
liqueur.
I won’t name every
single place we stepped foot in lest this travelogue become a travel-tome , but
will touch on some of the highlights. Suffice it to say, we saw thousands of
paintings. The Prado is every bit as marvelous as you’d think – a list of the
masterpieces they have would go on and on. We could barely cover it all in a
solid day. We strolled home that evening, completely exhausted, through the
nearby newly-refurbished Retiro Park, where the Rose Garden was at its best. The
Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum showcases a truly excellent private art collection –
not to be missed if you’re in Madrid. Although tickets were complicated to
obtain (and those we did manage to get were for a tour in Spanish), the
Monasterio de las Descalzas Reales (Convent of the Barefoot Royals) was well
worth the trouble. Twenty nuns still live here, surrounded by works of art that
came to the convent as part of the dowries of royal women destined for a life of
prayer.
The Palacio Real (still
used for state occasions) is a classic over-the-top lavish 18th century palace.
The Ermita de San Antonio de la Florida, Goya’s final resting place, is a gem of
a church with a cupola fancifully frescoed by the artist. Flower-lovers should
be sure to get to La Caixa Forum – the exterior of this exhibition space
features a 460 sq. meter vertical garden. By the way, Spain is a great place to
visit if you’re over 65 – if you show your passport, you’ll get a deeply
discounted admission to most of the sites.
Carol was somewhat
surprised to discover I had a hidden flamenco agenda, but she gamely went along
with it. In Madrid, we attended an excellent flamenco version of Carmen by the
Ballet Flamenco de Madrid.
Mimi Santini-Ritt 2010