Madrid - The Royal Capital (Part 2)

Whilst we were staying in Madrid, the festival of San Isidro was taking place. This is the main festival in Madrid and it is celebrated every year on the week around the 15th May. San Isidro is the patron saint of Madrid hence the reason why it is their most important celebration. 

There were many events going on during the week to celebrate the festival in the main plazas. Highlights for us included a free opera in the main square (Plaza Mayor), which was really interesting for us, as neither of us had seen an opera before. They sang many traditional songs in Spanish, which the crowd sometimes joined in on too, giving the whole event a really nice atmosphere. The thing that impressed me the most about it, is the fact that you can really feel the emotion in the voices of the singers, which then transmits itself to the audience. Wandering the streets after the opera we were also able to see many locals dressed in traditional outfits from years ago. This gave an authentic feel to everything that was going on, until we hit the main tourist street, where locals are selling bags, sunglasses and other various items on the street, always on the lookout incase a policeman is about.

Traditional Castillo dress

Near us across at the El Retiro park, which is like two minutes walk from where we stayed, they had a huge firework display on three of the nights of San Isidro. We told the guys we were staying with (Camilo and Daniel) about it and they decided to join us to see it as well. It was spectacular and lasted for nearly 20 minutes, it was a really nice way to end the day.

The lake in El Retiro

There are so many things to see in Madrid, you just don't feel like you have the time to see them all. The best way though to experience the city in my opinion though is to just walk around it and enjoy the many sites. Gran Via is the famous road where you can find all sorts of different shops, restaurants, bars and cafes, it is very much like Oxford Street in London. The other two main squares in Madrid are Plaza de Espana and Puerta del Sol, of which Puerta del Sol was our favourite, as it was bustling with activity at all hours of day and night with street performers, commuters, tourists, students and retired people, it also featured a statue of a bear eating from a strawberry tree, officially named El Oso y El Madrono. This is because apparently the land used to be called Ursaria (meaning 'Land of Bears' in latin), due to the large amount of them in the area and the local tree (Madrono). Unfortunately there are no bears left in the region and only one wild bear in the whole of Spain.

Carmen trying to steal the strawberries from the bear

Of particular interest when visiting Madrid is to go and see Palacio Real, which is next door to the cathedral. The palace was the residence of Carlos III and was also famous as it was the place where they signed the papers to become a member of the European Union. Upon entering the Palace entrance, you are greeted by a huge open courtyard, in which you could probably fit a whole football pitch. Looking to your left you can see the cathedral towering over the wall, looking very grand and impressive.

The Cathedral next to the Palacio Real

Palacio Real from the outside

Going into the palace building itself you are met with a wide staircase, and on the ceiling, high above you are beautiful paintings. This really sets the tone for what you encounter as you step through the palace. Each room is decorated uniquely, with its own theme, and it is truely magnificient to see. You were able to see a vast majority of the rooms, including the royal quarters, throne room, dining room, chapel and several different bedrooms and waiting rooms. You also went through rooms dedicated to a small sort of museum on weapons and armour from the 1700s. Unfortunately for us you are unable to take pictures inside the palace, so we are not able to show how beautiful it was, except for one sneaky little picture we were able to capture without the guards seeing!

Our very sneakily taken picture inside the Palacio Real

I was also lucky enough whilst in Madrid to meet up with another friend we had met earlier in our travels in Spain, this time a guy from Mexico named Efrain. Unfortunately Carmen was unable to come as she wasn't feeling so well on that day, but she did make it out later in the week to go see the biggest game of the season in the Spanish La Liga between Barcelona and Atletico Madrid to decide the winner of the league. Luckily for us Atletico Madrid did just enough to draw the match, meaning that they won the league, and that meant that everyone was happy as Daniel and Camilo the guys we were staying with both supported Atletico Madrid.

One of our favourite times in Madrid though included something a little bit different from the usual; we went to visit the Zoo! This was quite a novelty for us both as neither of us had been to the zoo since we were very young. It also felt good to do as it was different to everything else we had so far done in our travels. It was a wonderful day and we had great fun seeing all the different animals, (6000 in total of 500 different species). The main attraction and our favourite part of the zoo was without a doubt the pandas. They are so cute and fluffy it's unbelievable, you cannot help but fall in love with them.

The new born baby panda sleeping in a tree

The other great thing about the zoo is the fact that they also had shows that people could go to watch at different times throughout the day. We saw birds of prey and exotic birds flying just over the tops of peoples heads in one exhibition. We also saw sea-lions doing balancing tricks, clapping and making rude noises at everyone, but our favourite show was definitely the dolphins. They did a spectacular show, jumping out of the water, going through hoops and synchronising with each other. It was astonishing to see just how high they could leap out of the water, it was almost as if they could fly! The instructor even went in the water with them and was launched into the air by the dolphins as well; really impressive!

The dolphins leaping over the instructor

That pretty much concluded our trip in Madrid, which we were sad to be leaving as we had thoroughly enjoyed it, it was one of the places we could have seen ourselves living in.

Just as an aside note, I might add that Atocha train station in Madrid is the only station that I have so far encountered that houses a tropical garden inside it! It is easy to identify Atocha train station as it has two huge babies heads carved out of rock outside of it!

Carmen with one of the freaky baby heads