Madrid, Spain (October 16-19, 2006)

I finally pulled myself away from the beautiful Basque Country on Monday to head to central Spain for a visit to Madrid, Spain's capital. Despite being a large, sprawling city, Madrid is surprisingly walkable, safe and clean. I went walking around town Monday evening without paying attention to where I was going or what streets I was passing and kept ending up back at Puerto del Sol, the central intersection of Madrid, which also happens to be just down the street from my hostel.

Although it rained most of Tuesday, some new friends and I tried to do some sightseeing but spent most of the afternoon hanging out in the hostel once we decided we were tired of being wet. It was a fairly relaxing day and the hostel being a great place to meet people, I had fun swapping stories with my fellow hostellers.

Today (Wednesday) a few friends and I took a tour of the royal palace, an elaborately decorated former residence of the Spanish royalty, and did some more sightseeing around town. We actually happened to be wandering past the parliment building when they let out this afternoon; it reminded me of Capitol Hill with fancy, unmarked cars and TV stations waiting for the "important people" to emerge from the building. Tonight a big group from the hostel is heading out for a night on the town!

Tomorrow I head to Cordoba in southern Spain. I've posted some of my Madrid pictures at http://www.AndreasOdyssey.shutterfly.com.