2007: Where We Stayed, Ate, Went
(Back to take our leave, I note a few restaurants, hostals, and sites in red.)
We arrived at Atocha Station around 1:00 p.m. after leaving Barcelona early and having another great train ride. (For this trip, we paid for first class in order to get out early and because it didn't cost much more. We got a formal breakfast, with hot handtowels, good food and the movie Prairie Home Companion --nothing like Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin singing "Go Tell Aunt Rhody" in Spanish.) While experiencing BAM in Barcelona the night before, we had just missed La noche en blanco in Madrid, a one-night arts festival held in a different European City each year. We were in time for the European Curling Championships...but we decided to pass on them. This time in Madrid, on our way out, we mostly took long walks and shopped for chunches (thingies), as the Nicarguans call them, to take home.
We landed back at the Hostal Armesto again, then, in the later afternoon and evening, went to the Retiro, so different on Sunday than it had been on the weekday, hopping with a huge drum circle and other concerts, sidewalk puppet plays, and vendors, boats and lovers and children. We stayed till sunset and on into twilight, as the moon rose over the statues and the populace drifted home for dinner, then we headed for sangria at Plaza Santa Ana where a desultory waiter amused us as he shuffled along, eating chips out of the baskets he then delivered to the tables.
The 24th, our last full day in Spain, we walked to the Plaza Mayor's El Arco Artesania, modern crafts, where we bought several pieces of hand-made local jewelry for gifts. On the way back, I bought a lot of candy at La Mallorquina in Puerta del Sol. The manager was very nice, chatting to me about his long life in Madrid and the suburb he took the train from each morning. I bought the Madrileno violet-shaped and -scented candy in a variety of boxes, some with Goya prints (from the tapestries and not from the black paintings) and vintage coffee ads. Across the way in El Corte Ingles, Paul bought some CD's, and I bought food in the expansive deli-grocery store: Manchego and others cheeses, Yemas de Avila, cookies from Galicia. In tourist shops and in the park between our hostal and the Prado, I bought castanets, scarves, and fans, and though much of this is made in China these days, we were able to get most made in Spain or at least hand-painted in Spain to take home to nieces and sisters and Lisa (back in Maine, handling our rambunctious new puppies) and other special women in our lives.
We tried mightily to find another vegetarian restaurant to try, but couldn't find one we felt comfortable with and intead went to Sanabresa, just in time to get a table before the line stretched out the door--and it's not as if the tables aren't packed tight. It's my kind of place, very neighborhoody, home-cooking type of place--no Gringos here, oh, except us. I had fried eggplant, Madrileno-style tripe (in tomato sauce), and Santiago cake, while Paul had gazpacho, rice in tomato sauce and profiteroles, bread and a bottle of wine to share, all for 8 eruos a piece. There was one cigar smoker, right next to us naturally, but he left early and his smoke dissipated. I'd definitely return here.
We walked to the bookstore of the Reina Sofia Museum to buy the big, hulking art book on Maria Blanchard they had saved for me (see Madrid at the beginning), surely the single biggest item I have ever carried on a plane, which meant that I couldn't carry on too much else. Here, as in Barcelona, we frequented the nearest Starbucks, right at the foot of the hill from the hostal, across from the statue of Neptune. The young people working there were friendly, recognized us by our second visit, and so though I usually hate Starbucks, we went every morning, and on this, our last night, got a salad from there and ate it, watching the dogs in the neighborhood hanging out with their owners in the teeny plaza with the Calderon de la Barca statue as night came on. Paul and me and a salad and Calderon in a plaza with dogs, a great way to end the trip. What we had, we have.
