December 26, 2013: Madrid Round 2

"Travel teaches toleration." -Benjamin Disraeli
If I had not already said it before, I will say it now.  Travel is a true test of a relationship, whether it be with family, friends or a significant other.  Tensions can run high or you can experience travel euphoria.  Usually, it is a mix of the two.  I definitely think my friendship with my best friend has grown stronger through this journey.  We learned a lot about each other. We learned what makes the other one tick, makes the other one uncomfortable, and of course makes the other one laugh.

We started off with a walking tour of Madrid hosted my Sandemans New Madrid Free Walking Tour. I had gone to one in Amsterdam and thought it was such a priceless (get it?) experience and I really learned a lot about the city.  This one was not as great as the one in Amsterdam but still a quality tour regardless. After all, Madrid is not exactly the city of vice, but they do have a complicated story of succession of kings, one that I could not recall even if I tried.

After the tour we walked to the Templo De Debod which was a great FREE thing to see.  It's a very scenic attraction (one of my favorites pictures from the entire trip) and has an interesting backstory.  Look it up if you have the time.

We walked around the two squares Plaza Mayor and Puerta Del Sol again.  Eager to eat, we stopped at a little shop (and I mean little) and ordered two calamari sandwiches which I didn't know at the time was actually a very popular food item in Madrid.  They were pretty inexpensive too (flashback to all the times I payed a large sum to eat calamari in America).

That pretty much ended our last full day in Europe.  Susan, if you are reading this, thank you for everything.  I couldn't imagine doing this with anyone else but you. Sidenote: How freaky is that dark cloud behind the Palacio Real?

December 25, 2013: Merry Christmas from Barcelona

"Christmas isn't a season. It's a feeling." -Edna Ferber

If I were to rank all the Christmases that I have had, this would easily be in the top 3 if not #1.  We didn't do anything too special in the morning since we had to get on a train to go back to Madrid.  Another two and a half hours later, we arrived and took a taxi to our hotel.  I don't remember too much about the hotel except that the floor in the bar area had glass and you could see the basement which was decorated in a very unique way (see below) and we stayed in a bright pink room.

We went out to walk the streets and the two main busy areas, Plaza Mayor and Puerta Del Sol (Puerta Del Sol is much better).  Be warned, these are high traffic areas.  We ate at a McDonald's there (classy right?).  We walked around a little more, waiting for the big Christmas tree to light up, which it eventually did and we awkwardly asked a Chinese tourist to take our photo.

We went back to the hotel and decided to indulge ourselves at the bar.  I saw that they had fresh sangria which I didn't know until after that day that sangria actually originated from Spain (that explains the pronunciation).  Susan and I had both ordered sangria.  She took a one-and-done sip and then proceeded to order champagne, oranges and molten chocolate cake.  So guess who got to drink two glasses of sangria?  Needless to say, I was a little buzzed and giggly that night.

Double the pleasure, Double the fun 

I want all oranges to be prepared for consumption in this manner from now on.

Cue mouth-watering...

We went back to our room and listed to some Pete Holmes comedy bits.  If you don't know who he is, you are missing out on a good laugh. He's even got his own talk show on TBS. It was a great end to a great day. I loved being able to share this day with my best friend. Bon Nadal Barcelona. Feliz Navidad Madrid.
(Susan asked me to take a photo of her doing this, so I thought it was only appropriate for me to share it with the world wide web. You're Welcome Susan.)