Madrid: Open all hours except when you need it!

Hi Guys. We've been disconnected from the internet umbilical cord for awhile and unable to blog. So let's catch up. After Tenerife in the Canary Islands, we flew straight to Madrid, and to be blunt, we didn't like it near as much as Barcelona. If you visit only one place in Spain, make it Barcelona, not Madrid. Food is better, people are nicer, and the vibe is, how you say in Espanol, mas simpatico!

That said, Madrid does have some fascinating buildings and lovely parks. Trouble is, we are totally and completely out of whack with Spanish time. You wake up and go out for a coffee at what you, in your silly, non-latin, uptight Northern European mindset, is the very late hour of 9am, only to find out that not one cafe is open except for Starbucks (note to Starbucks tragics - you can be excused for drinking at Starbucks in Spain for this reason. In Italy, NEVER!).

A kitchen in your hotel room is essential (our kitchenette was in a closet in the hotel room hallway!) because by the time you get your shit together to go to the shop, everything is closed again for lunch and does not open again until 4.30. Impossible! But you can open your hotel window and see people lining up to go into a comedy club at 1 am in the morning! We, of course, are never in that queue because we are old and already in bed. Imagine doing this trip when we are even older than we are now???? No way, Jose.

Well that's okay. While we were awake, we ate tapas, we drank fantastic Spanish wine for $10 a bottle, we laid in the park watching backpackers and spagnolas sunbathe in their bra and underwear (Miles was very interested in this local custom) and of course, we went to museums and palaces in Madrid - the famous Prado, and the Thyssen Bonemisza museum - a collection of art across 5 centuries including many famous artists, that was owned by one obviously ludicrously wealthy family and sold to the state of Spain for 300 million dollars. A bargain when you see it all.

We also saw the lead up to the regional elections, which brought thousands of young people out to protest. They are not happy that Spain's economy is in the toilet and the EU, IMF and World Bank are insisting on harsh reforms. We were amused at their naivete and not sympathetic as they will have to take their medicine sometime - but boy, those Spaniards know how to get out and get angry about stuff. They took over the central metro station, camping out and plastering the entire glass dome over the metro entrance with posters, messages and banners (see top photo).

Most of all, we spent a lot of time hanging out of our hotel window looking over the Gran Via, just watching life pass by in all colourful shapes and sizes. The stores may be closed, but your mind tends to stay more open when you see how they do it in another part of the globe.