Madrid

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Madrid - a city of two sides. I saw the back side.

Well, it was bound to happen. I met some fun people in Madrid and got excessively pissed. Toby, Olga, Yuri and Martha, it was a blast. I feel slightly as though I missed out on the cultural and historic sights of Madrid, but I absolutely lived its other side to the fullest. The walking tour that we did manage to take was stunning - Madrid truly is a lovely place to be, especially around the royal gardens. Of course, this tour did end with us getting pissed with the guide. Meh.

I arrived into Madrid after an overnight bus from Bordeaux, which was fairly torturous. The hostel wasn´t ready for check in until 11, so I went for a very strong coffee and visited the zoo and aquapark. Madrid Zoo was much like any other, the exception being the displays. I saw the birds of prey and dolphin shows, and each was spectacular in its own right. The dolphins seemed to be enjoying the show almost as much as the crowd, though I suppose eating lots of free fish helps. Afterwards I returned to the hostel and met the folks who would convince me that staying awake past 40 hours would be a good idea. After 5 litres of beer, at about 1 in the morning, I finally got to sleep.

The next day I took the walking and tapas tour organised by the hostel. This is the tour that ended in a drunken state. We sat in a plaza and ate tapas and drank beer, talking about anything that we could all understand in a single language. It was great to have friends about, and feel more like a backpacker than a tourist. That night I took it fairly easy, after the drunken fiasco of the previous night.

For my last day in Madrid, I went to Toledo instead. A few of us were meant to go, but only Martha (Seattle girl with German and Irish roots) and I actually went. Toledo is absolutely undescribable. It helped that the weather was spectacular, but it was really a total gem. The old city walls and towers make for wonderful views, and the people and the food are spicy and interesting. There were so many little streets to explore, so many wonderful characters to encounter, so many stunning, dream-like sights to see...words cannot capture Toledo´s charm.

For my last night in Madrid, we went out on a pub crawl tour. It was tremendous fun, even if I had to hold back a little on the booze - renting a car the next morning would have gone badly otherwise. Martha decided to tag along with me at about 5am, so after a few hours sleep, the road trip was all set to begin.

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Photos

Zero Kilometers
All distances measured from here for Madrid