We took the day to visit Toledo, an historic city about an hour south of Madrid. This place is special. It was the original capital of Spain before Madrid took that title 400 years ago. The city is a labyrinth of tiny endless roads featuring Christian, Muslim and Jewish religious buildings dating back a thousand years and more. The active catholic cathedral was breathtaking. The pictures don’t do it justice.
Yesterday was a rest day. Kids slept til 1 then we wandered to the park and spent the day playing frisbee and relaxing. Much needed break.
On the way to the park we stopped for lunch and then got reservations for a flamenco show.
I had my first official sangria….I’m hooked. So delicious….
Had our first bad meal today :(. Paella that had undercook shrimp and clams (though we ordered one with no clams). I did not eat it because with my allergies it was too many risk factors….oh well – I did have another sangria which was equally delicious!
The flamenco show was absolutely breathtaking. Very raw and aggressive. Different than anything I have seen before….mallory loved the guitar and Bob and I were mesmerized by the dancers. Connor fell asleep 🙂
After this eventful night we went for churros and chocolate at midnight. That was a treat! Super delish!
We bought Mallory a ukulele. She was lamenting no instrument for two months, so we bought her a small transportable one. May complicate air travel a bit – but is making downtime more enjoyable for us all.
Good day all the way around:)
Day two in Madrid…. Highlights of the day: thwarting a pickpocket (yay me), super cute bike tour guide (yay Mal), not getting run over by a taxi (yay Connor) and dinner in Madrid’s oldest restaurant (yay Bob)….
Yes, a 12 year old boy tried to steal my cell phone off the table using the old “bait and switch”, but I figured out what he was doing and stopped him just as he laid the menu over my phone and was about to scoop it up…pickpockets are notorious here and all the women eat with their purses in their laps. Takes some getting used to, but if you stay aware it is no problem.
Bike tour was very fun and kind of scary with all the traffic and navigating around all the pedestrians – Mal and I stayed in the back with the cute sweeper guide…. Connor stayed in front with the lead guide and really owned the road (much to everyone’s terror). It is a great way to see the city.
Dinner at El Botin – we all had the special – roast suckling pig. It was really good…but the gaspacho was the best!
Tomorrow we see flamenco dancers!!!!
We arrived in Madrid yesterday after a red-eye flight from New York. What a beautiful city! We have rented an apartment near Puerta del Sol which is walking distance to most everywhere in central Madrid. Quite a contrast to New York where everything was hustle-bustle. Here the pace is more tranquil maybe because many of the streets are pedestrian only. No car horns here only the sound of street music, footsteps and continual spanish banter.
The people here are beautiful and friendly especially when you try to speak Spanish. We are hobbling along in that department but are improving each day.
We took a bicycle tour through the city today. In three hours Connor managed to crash into a police car, take out a passenger car mirror, and suffer at least three spills, but he is ecstatic tonight for having such a great time. He refused to stay behind with us and pushed on to stay with the tour leader the whole three hours. Watching him careen past taxi cabs caused my heart to race a bit, but fearless Connor pushed on unfazed. Tomorrow we rent rollerblades and tour the Central Park here. I hope we can avoid medical facilities!
We have already talked about moving here when the kids are out of the nest. We really like Madrid!
We began our European tour with a long weekend stopover in New York. Still in the U.S., but like a foreign land in many ways. I lived in New York in the mid 90s before Lisa and I got married, and Lisa came out to visit a lot. So for us this was a trip to revisit old haunts (wow – it has changed a lot since then!). But this was a totally new experience for Mallory and Connor. I enjoyed watching their expressions as they took in the sheer audacity of New York, especially the controlled chaos of Times Square on a Friday night.
In the course of about 48 hours we tried to take in as many sights as we could: Times Square, Grand Central, the Statue of Liberty, The Empire State Building, China Town, and Ground Zero. We spent the afternoon in Central Park, then took in the Upper West Side and Harlem via the double-decker tour buses. We visited the Met and MOMA, and of course sample some great pizza and bagels. We must have walked the entire length of the island by the end of the weekend. We couldn’t see it all but we tried.
We got special tickets to climb 360 steps to visit the very crown of Lady Liberty. Here we are inside the crown:
Connor “volunteered” to join in this amazing street performance:
Mallory at the Metropolitan Museum of Fine Art.
Connor really liked the pizza!
On our last morning, I got up early to make a pilgrimage to Apple’s flagship store on 5th Avenue. The only Apple store open 24 hours a day. I got there just after 5 am. Very cool.
Next stop: Madrid!
This is the last night in our whirlwind New York stay. We are utterly exhausted… Day 1 we got up early, walked to find a subway, then ended up taking a cab to Battery Park because we were running late. Statue of Liberty tour was great. We were able to go all the way up to the crown (very hard for me, cuz I am afraid of heights).
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Our dream trip to Europe starts this week! Two more days of school followed by two final days to get everything ready for departure before we blast off. Leaving home for two months takes a lot of pre-planning, but I think we have everything covered.
Since this is a once-in-a-lifetime trip, we want to share it with family and friends and keep a permanent record of our adventures. In the old days, we would have had the kids keep a journal. Today we blog. Each of us will be posting our experiences here on the-breens.com as we make our way through eight weeks of European experiences.
Traveling light is our mantra for this trip. Too often we pack too much stuff and end up lugging huge bags around with stuff we didn’t need to bring. Packing for a two-month trip brings its own set of challenges, particularly the climate differences between Madrid and Dublin, but we’ve all agreed that we can fit everything we need in a single carry on. Since laundry facilities are included on many of the places we’ve rented, we really only need to bring a week of clothing.
