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Published: October 6th 2019
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If you read the blog title, date and location details (you’d be the only one) you would know we have moved a little from central Madrid to the outskirts of Madrid and quite near the airport. We found a cheapish but nice place 5 minutes from the airport with a free shuttle bus that will get us to the airport as the desired time. They must be pretty used to shuttling guests as it’s part of their check in procedure and they had the desired check in times for all the airlines, what terminal they departed from... Despite the tourist season being in full flight here (I assumed based on the sheer number of tourists in central Madrid) and the fact that it’s 30 degrees the hotel has declared ‘busy time’ over and closed their pool for Winter. Shame but it’s not the worst thing to happen. Lee has decided it’s time for a drink rather than a swim, spoken like someone who forgot their bathers. We took the Metro here, necessitating the purchase of a card. The card is then loaded and used when required. The card, for both of us, cost €2 and is valid for 10 years. Please
note Vic government and Metro trains and my kids! Even with the cost of the card the 2 journeys cost less than $10. The airport taxi fee is set by law at a flat rate of €30 which is close to $43 so the Metro here is very good value. The system is very easy to understand and navigate through and around and there are station staff to assist with ticket purchases. There are stations all over Madrid and even one that goes directly to the airport. Services commence at 6 o’clock in the morning and we need to be there at 6:30 so we thought that a bit tight hence the new home.
Again we had a walk centered on Plaza Mayor bit with more concentration on a few purchases. Similarly we indulged in our now customary beer o’clock ritual but supplemented it with some fried calamari, sardines and fish balls (who knew fish had so many balls!). So like locals we sat, drank, ate and drank and watched the world go by. We couldn’t eat all our dish, so much for tapas size! We did however manage another beer. Here you can buy 5 bottles of San
Miguel beer in a bucket of ice to keep them cool for €4. Beer is cheaper than lemonade here!
Our hotel held our luggage for us which is a very handy service.so after saying bye to our favourite waiter we were off and effectively saying bye to Madrid. We are very much is the suburbs here but they still beer and I noticed a couple of cheap cafe/restaurants not far away so soon we will go for a walk and a reconnaissance mission.
We have had a ball in Madrid. Once you get past the ’African ambassadors of friendships’ (who are decidedly unfriendly when you say no, even politely) its quite a charming place. The atmosphere is good, the temperature pretty good, the architecture really good, the food especially good and the people are terrific. Lee would like to spend a month here so that’s a big call on her behalf. So ‘Muchas gracias’ Madrid. Bye for now.
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