Taking in some art on a Sunday afternoon

Sunday, July 18th, 2010

We woke early this morning to take a taxi from our hotel in Seville to the train station to catch an 8:45 a.m. train to Madrid. The trip was about two and a half hours, much better than the eight our train ride it took us to get to Seville. Upon our arrival in the Madrid Atocha train station we got directions from a lady at the tourist information booth on how to get to our hotel by metro. I have to admit the first couple of times we arrived in a city without knowing EXACTLY where our hotel was and how to get to it, I was a bit stressed, but by now I’ve learned, that there is a tourist office in every train station/airport and if you can’t quite get to where you are going with their directions alone, that people are generally happy to help you find your way. We followed the lady’s directions, switching metro lines once and arrived at the metro station she said was closest to our hotel. The hotel was not in direct sight, so I asked a bystander if they knew where it was, and sure enough, they kindly pointed us in the right direction. Once at the hotel we checked in and dropped our bags before heading back in to the center of town on the Metro.

I had read in our travel guide that a couple of Madrid’s more famous museums were free on Sundays, so we decided to give a couple of them a go. First stop was the Museo de Arte de Reina Sofia, Madrid’s modern art museum and home to works by such famous Spanish artists as Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali, Joan Miro, among others. After touring the areas of the museum where many of these artists’ works are featured, we left the museum to grab some lunch, as it was nearly after 2 o’clock at this point.

After lunch we walked down to the El Prado Museum, Spain’s most famous museum. When we reached the ticket booth however we realized that the free hours did not start until 5:00 p.m. So we decided to come back a little later so we could take advantage of the free admittance. Instead we went to the Caixa Forum and toured a moving photography exhibit that was featured there. After exploring the Caixa Forum we stopped for a snack and to relax for a bit before heading back to the Prado Museum.

Shortly after five o’clock we walked back in the direction of the Prado Museum, however, to our dismay we discovered that we weren’t the only ones looking to take advantage of the free admission, the line was a couple hundred yards long, and not being the biggest art museum people to begin with, we decided to give it a pass. So we made our way back towards the metro station, stopping first at the train station to book our tickets to Toledo for tomorrow before heading back to our hotel.

The remainder of the evening we spent in the area around our hotel. We went for a couple of drinks and a snack at a café nearby before returning to our hotel. A couple of hours later we inquired about restaurants in the area or markets, only to discover that not much was open in the area on a Sunday evening, so we ended up going back to the same café for dinner, I don’t think they recognized us, but we felt a bit silly.

Tomorrow we rise early to take a train to Toledo where we will spend the day.