SHIRLEY DE KOCK GUELLER was on the move and spent 48 hours in a Madrid. Here’s her take on the city:
Green and grand. My first impressions of a city I had not been to in years. Beautiful, historic, trendy in expensive areas like Santander, and huge (ish) at some 7 million people.
Fortunately, the most interesting old part of the city is walkable and walking is what we did. In search of colour and tapas bars and we found plenty of both – friendly and helpful people, gorgeous shops and delicious bites like shrimp, paella and ham in lots of ways. Plenty for the vegetarian too. Rioja and vino blanco slid down smoothly, and even a beer or two for mid-September was hot even though day light only came about 8 am.
Starting with a sangria on the hotel roof bar on the Gran Via with a gorgeous view of the rooftops of the city, the palace and cathedrals, we soon went in search of more and wandered through some of the smaller narrow streets, happening across some homespun tapas bars where the only language spoken was Spanish.
A bonus, for Madrid seems to be choice of Spanish speaking tourists above all. English, especially American English, was fortunately in short supply, and so were loud voices.
Laid-back atmosphere
Another plus for the city is that it is also unbelievably hooter free, and the pedestrians obey the traffic lights. It would be hard not to because the cars come from so many directions and not obeying them is asking for trouble. It’s a city in one felt part of the fabric not an interloper, perhaps a traveler and not a tourist!
We also felt safe – maybe that was from ignorance of the real picture but statistics actually bear this out – the crime rate is indeed low although you are warned about pick pockets and the hotel had a security guard in the foyer.
From the moment I arrived I felt the laid-back atmosphere… the polite immigration folk, the Covid papers checking staff, the helpful man in the arrivals hall when my pick-up driver was late. That sorted, the drive into the city was uneventful (and silent) and superficially quite dull so I was delighted to see, once closer to the old city, how wrong I was.
After a quick shower, I took the red bus, twice, to get my bearings before walking around and treating myself to dinner… grilled garlic shrimp and two glasses of wine for R700 in a pavement café behind the main streets. Service is included because waiting is a profession and is efficient, friendly and quick. One person serves dozens of tables and one never waited long.
Rococo ceilings
After a breakfast of fruit and various kinds of ham and cheese (and frittata if required) came pouring rain and a tour of the Palace the next day was overwhelming… confusing because the kings and queens were, according to the guide, not Carlos and Isobel (as the late British queen was referred to during her televised funeral service on TV), but Charles III and Elizabeth. Also overwhelming were the Rococo ceilings, the tapestries and the paintings and if I never see another roomful of porcelain and silver it will be too soon.
At least we only went through 20 of the 3000 rooms (one with a Stradivarius or two). The upper floor of the Palace used to house the servants, 3000 of them, in the days the royal family lived there. The current king and his journalist wife live in the Palace of Zarzuela on the edge of the City and the erstwhile Juan Carlos, king emeritus, is living outside Spain amongst accusations of impropriety. Felipe Vl only comes to the palace for ceremonial occasions like receiving the credentials of new ambassadors, we were told.
Almudena Cathedral
Next to the imposing Royal Palace is the main Basilica, Almudena Cathedral. It was only consecrated by Pope John Paul 11 in 1993 but the Gothic style and the ceiling belie its youth. The panorama from the roof is magical but then so was that from our hotel rooftop! About a 15 minute walk from there is the Royal Basilica of San Francisco (St Francis the Great), with its mind-blowingly beautiful dome, apparently one of the largest in Europe.
A walk through the old city took me past the Mercato San Miguel, iconic testament to the cuisine of Spain – Galician seafood (octopus is a specialty) and local cheeses and a variety of what must be amongst the best bread ever; the enormous array of tapas and wines and beers was tempting but although there weren’t that many of the 10 million visitors a day we didn’t really want to spend the night standing to sample the fare.
The beautiful Teatro Real, the Opera House, and in its latest incarnation also a concert hall, had Phillip Glass as its season opener. I missed that I am afraid.
Apart from its architectural splendour, Madrid also has Prado. What can one say? From Goya to Goya, Velasquez to Goya with Rubéns, Titian and Tiepolo in between made the Met Museum in New York look poor! Not really but you get the feeling. You probably need an hour at a time or take a couple of weeks to get to terms with it. It’s truly overpowering and splendid.
Madrid isn’t cheap. A child’s Real Madrid t- shirt set me back neatly 1300 and two and a half litres of water another 120. Staying on the Gran Via was worth every cent. It’s central although bus and metro transport is efficient. And Uber is widely used. Streets are well marked but some are so small they are not named on a map and it’s very easy to lose your way. There’s no Table Mountain as a guide so taking photographs of junctions was almost as good as Hansel and Gretel’s trail of bread crumbs.
Although I was in Madrid as a stopover on my way to Sarria and a walk on part of the Camino, I will be back. It’s a city for a real holiday with much more time.
What: 48 Hours in Madrid travel
WS
