Michelle's Travel Adventures

Madrid & Toledo

Day 1 Madrid

We drove to Barcelona from Penedes, dropped off our rental car near the train station and then caught our high speed train to Madrid.  The whole process was easy peasy.  Especially since I had the correct google map settings and we were able to get on the highway this time!!!

We arrived in Madrid a little after 3pm and went directly to our Airbnb to check in.  Our Airbnb was absolutely beautiful!  Floor to ceiling windows, and each window had a balcony.  2 bedrooms and 2 1/2 bathrooms.  Beautiful modern kitchen.  The shower was spectacular.  But unbeknownst to us at the time of booking this Airbnb was in prime nightclub area, and let me tell you, it was hopping at night!  Until the wee hours of the morning!  So needless to say we did not get a ton of sleep here, even though we had our ear plugs. 

On our first night in Madrid we walked around Plaza de Santa Ana (which is beautiful!) and Plaza Mayor (which was very busy and there must have been a soccer match because there was a lot of hooting and hollering going on!) before making it to our dinner reservation for the evening.  Our dinner was at Astor Puerta Cerrada, and this restaurant was wonderful in all the ways you hope for.  The service was top notch, the ambience was perfect, and the food was delicious!  Astor Puerta Cerrada was our number 1 restaurant experience of the trip!  We started with Iberian ham croquettes (of course!) on pea puree, which were amazing , and the Astor Salad, which is an arugula and cabbage salad.  For our mains we had  Iberian barbecue ribs with roasted pumpkin, Gorgonzola cheese and pistachios, Argentinian ribeye steak and fries with chimichurri sauce, and our third dish was a tagliatelle pasta with truffle and parmigiana sauce.  Wow!  Soooo good!!! All of it!

After dinner Stephen and Makena headed back to the Airbnb and Macy and I wandered around the city for a bit.  Madrid is really beautiful!  We came across a group of classical musicians playing on the sidewalk, we saw some street performers and all that nonsense at Puerta del Sol, and we even found a Tim Hortons!!!  We finished the night with a gelato from the shop below our Airbnb and called it a night.

Day 2 Madrid

Today is our wander around the city day. Nothing was booked so we were totally on our own time line. For breakfast Macy and I grabbed the famous pastries from La Mallorquina. So buttery and flakey and delicious! And then stopped in at the Mercado de San Miguel for a coffee and a sausage roll for Makena. And I’m Pleased to report that the market was not insane at this early hour and I did not have a melt down lol. I even have a picture to prove it! Ha! Look at me all cool as a cucumber!

Next we headed along Calle Mayor, stopping to see Plaza Mayor and Plaza de la Villa, which eventually lead us to the magnificent Palacio Real.  Holy this place makes Buckingham Palace seem quaint.  The Spanish Palace is beautiful, the church bells just happened to be ringing while we were there, it was a fun experience.  Plaza Oriente, the park across from the palace was also really beautiful. It was starting to get really hot so we decided we needed to look for some refreshments!  We stopped in to El Riojano for a hot chocolate and lady finger cakes.  They did not have churros, but the cakes were interesting texture and the chocolate was delicious.

We decided to head back to the market for lunch since it seemed good for Makena’s breakfast. WE SHOULD NOT HAVE TEMPTED FATE!  It was jam packed, people pushing and shoving, babies crying, and the food was inedible.  Ahhhh wellllll….

In the afternoon we explored the Parque del Buen Retiro.  Our highlight was the Palacio de Cristal and the little pond in front of it filled with turtles.  And the 

For dinner we went to La Finica De Susana.  It was one of our least favourite restaurants of our trip.  I found it in our Lonely Planet guide book, and it was near our Airbnb and I thought we’d give it a go.  The food was not great, it felt very geared to tourists, and was one of those types of places where you felt they are trying to get you fed and out the door as fast as possible.  So dinner was a miss too! 😦

Day 3 Toledo

Holy Toledo!  I actually love how travel teaches you so much, and often things you never expected to learn.  So I often heard the phrase Holy Toledo and I had no idea where the saying came from or what the actual context was.  Until now!  Today we traveled to Toledo with our private guide from Wine Tourism Spain.  Hugo, our guide, was so knowledgeable and answered our many questions to the best of his ability, we always seem to have so many questions (especially Stephen!). 

So our first stop of the day was in Toledo.  Toledo was a holy place because in the Middle Ages it was a city where Christian, Muslim and Jewish cultures coexisted peacefully.  Stop number one is the impressive gothic style Catedral which has many artistic masterpieces, including the monstrance made with 18 kg of pure gold, but my favourite was the Transparente, which is illuminated by a light well carved into the dome above.

Then we headed into the Jewish quarter of the city to visit the Sinagoga de Santa Maria La Blanca.  Which was interesting for us especially since it was our first time in a synagogue.

Next we visited Santo Tome church which is the home of El Greco’s most famous masterpiece The Burial of the Count of Orgaz.  The artwork depicts a local legend in which Saints Augustine and Stephen descend from heaven to assist in the burial of Don Gonzalo Ruiz (Count of Organ), who was a native of Toledo and a beloved philantropist.

We also stopped in to see a local jewelry shop that is renowned for its damasquinados jewelry.  Damascening is the Moorish art of inlaying gold and silver threads into black steel in a decorative pattern.  The girls and I each picked out a beautiful pair of earrings.

Then we crossed the river to take in the panoramic views of Toledo.  It is so gorgeous, the views are unreal.  We could have stayed and looked at Toledo for hours but we had a schedule to keep, so on we go!

After driving for a bit, we arrived at the windmills of La Mancha.  This place was so cool and totally worth the visit!  Each of the Consuegra windmills has a unique name, taken from the novel, in which Don Quixote de La Mancha mistakes the towers for giants and picks a fight with them.  They also had local saffron for sale at the information centre so we bought a bottle to take home with us.

For lunch we stopped at a little hole in the wall.  And I mean this almost literally!  There is no way we would have ever found this spot on our own.  We had some delicious, homey dishes including a bread and chorizo salad topped with grapes, a chilled eggplant and tomato stew, a lamb dish, and a very unique to us dessert.  They called it fried milk (leche frita), and it was served on top of a saffron spiced custard dotted with pomegranate seeds.  If you are ever in Spain and have an opportunity to try Leche frita. 

After lunch we could’ve really used a siesta, but again we had a busy schedule  to keep so on we go! Our last and final stop of the day was our wine tour at Bodegas Jesus Diaz.  The Bodegas Jesus Diaz is a 5th generation family run winery.  It’s currently run by Antoni, and that is who gave us the tour of the cellars and wine tasting.  He couldn’t speak English and since we don’t understand Spanish, our guide Hugo was able to interpret the whole thing for us.  During the tasting we tried a white, a rose and a red.  We liked all 3 but since Stephen really liked the red, we purchased the red.

Day 4 Madrid

Our last day in Spain!  We decided to hit up Mango as we really hadn’t done any shopping yet.  The Mango stores in Madrid were pretty awesome, so we did spent the majority of the morning shopping. For lunch we went to La Paella de la Reina.  We had a delicious pitcher of Sangria, and a gazpacho and a salad as our starter.  And we finally had the paella experience we were hoping for!  The paella here is so good!  We ordered the chorizo, chicken and vegetable paella, it was massive, and it was delicious!

After lunch we strolled Gran Via.  This street is so pretty, the buildings are all so beautiful!  And we finally had some churros and hot chocolate!

For dinner we went Cedron Wine Bar.  A really cute, small Argentinian style restaurant that focuses on local, organic and biodynamic wines.  For our starters we had….drumroll….Iberian ham croquettes (it never got old I swear!) and viteloo tomato, which isa cold sliced veal covered in a creamy, mayonnaise like sauce.  Never had anything like that before…and probably give it a pass if I ever see it on a menu again lol

For our mains we had Argentine style Milanesa and French fries (yum!), and eggplant parmigiana (also very good) and Argentina skirt steak with chimichurri and French fries (loved!)

After dinner we headed back to our Airbnb and back up for an early morning departure.  We had a long travel day home.  Our flight out of Madrid was delayed.  Then because we we going to miss our connection in Toronto we were put on the last flight out to Halifax.  Then Stephen was determined to drive home to PEI after we landed in Halifax at about 10 pm. So we finally made it to PEI at about 2:30 AM. Totally exhausted and jet lagged!  In hindsight, play it safe and book the night at an airport hotel instead of driving exhausted.  You’ll feel better in the morning!