Well, we arrived late in the day, and somehow managed the three metro trains to get to Magdalena, the street from which we would find our hostel... After a brief moment of disorientation, we found our way to this quaint little hostel, which really was more like a hotel. We had our own room, with four beds, and it was really nice to have our own space.
By this stage it was about 11pm, and we were HUNNNNNGRYYYYYY!!! We had yet to orientate ourselves with Spanish time, and so we went in search of food. Thankfully, we had wandered past a little cafe at the bottom of the road, and decided to go there. This place smelt good, and even though they didnt speak one word of English, we managed to order "potatas bravas" (baked potatoes with a spicy tomato sauce) Kylea had a Spanish Tortilla (looked goooood!) and Anna and I ordered this amazing tapas-style plate, with 5 typical Spanish dishes- Croquettas, Ruska salata, some type of chicken nibbles, etc etc...
It was in our little Spanish restaurant that we met some very cool Americans- Kaare (pronounced Corey) and Steve. They are engineers from Orlando, Florida, and it was actually because of their divine intervention that we even ate anything from the restaurant, because Kaare came over and helped us order. We invited them to sit at our table and we spent the next hour and a half chatting and laughing and learning how much life in America is like living in a bubble...!! We wandered round Madrid with them for a little after dinner, but it was cold so we parted ways. But it was lovely to meet them, and perhaps one day we will meet again :)
After a really good sleep in (till 2pm!) we organised ourselves and went for a wander around Madrid. It wasnt particularly beautiful, or clean (there is so much graffiti!) but we enjoyed ourselves. However, as we meandered through this cute park with a big lake in the middle (with paddle boats that we wanted to go on, but it was shut) it started raining! We sought shelter in this really beautiful little church which was entirely decorated by mosaic tile! I was very impressed. We also found this fantastic little chocolate shop and got a hot chocolate, which was like the ones at Chocolate Boutique in Parnell: Entirely melted chocolate!! So amazing, but it was so rich, I couldnt finish it!! (Yes, believe it or not, Zoe threw out chocolate...!)
This city, I swear, comes alive at night time! We had the best time as soon as it got dark (and we got our chocolate hit) it was SO beautiful! Kylea and I suddenly became complete loonies with our camera's and snap-snap-snapped away for so long, I swear Anna got bored standing round :P It was really the lights, it brought all the buildings to life, gave them these fantastic personalities that were so different to the 'ordinary' buildings which looked just like the ones in Paris and Rome...
This said also, the greatest thing we did in Madrid was the €12 Pub Crawl!! (€12, or €10? I dont remember, it was cheap either way!) It got us into three bars and a nightclub at the end of it all, with a drink at each bar! It was fantastic, and so pumping, with GREAT music, and all the people we met-- more Americans (brothers), some guys from Singapore, three brothers from France who-- DANCED LIKE ROBERT!!! Hahahah :P There were also two cute Brazilians (that country is amazing, i have to go there...) The best guys though were this gay couple from America, they were so friendly and lovely and danced with us and it was a right riot!! The other thing we noticed (after we got home!) was the fact that there was a complete imbalance in the men to women ratio, so that was nice :P ha ha ha
Oh well!! At the end of it all, we got home at (a very responsible time of) 4am, even though we had to back-track because we had no idea where we were, and couldnt find Magdalena... Oh well :P The sleep in was great, and we had a 'late' check out of 11am so packed all our stuff, showered, and made our way back to the airport, a little hungover but nothing a coffee and greasy food couldnt fix!! (this is our breakfast-- never rely on airport food for a good and healthy recovery...)
PS look at the people sleeping behind Anna- HAHAHA the guys sleeping with his hand in his pants!!
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