This is the soccer stadium that is 3/4 mile from our apartment, though it sure sounded closer when the game was going.
Did not see one of these in action, but mopeds, motorcycles, scooters are understandably popular, with the parking challenges.
Nope – we didn’t do it!! This is a mail box, comparable to our blue boxes. Laura
We have been planning our next steps. Before we left Tacoma we booked flights from Madrid to Malta at 6:20 on January 11 and our first place to stay on Gozo. Malta is an archipelago but from a population standpoint consist of two main islands, Malta itself, sometimes called Valletta which is the capital of Malta, and Gozo. Gozo is about 26 square miles and 38,000 people. It is about 8.7 miles by 4.5 miles – not a very big Island. The main Island of Malta is 94 square miles and 400,000 people. We will be in Malta for about a month, the first 8 days on Gozo and the remaining on the “big island”. Today we looked at the bus schedule and found we can take the 1X bus from the airport to the le-Cirkewwa ferry dock where we will travel on to Gozo. The proprietor for our Gozo place said he will pick us up at the dock if we let him know our schedule. Looks like the ferry leaves about every 45 minutes. You can buy a bus ticket for all day for 1.5 euro and the airport buses allow for luggage. We also just booked our first place to stay when we return to the big island. We booked two weeks but told the proprietor we may stay a third. This particular place is only 20 euro a night ($24) a pretty good price but did not want to commit the whole time without seeing it. The proprietor said he would reserve the third week just in case. Malta is interesting in that it is an amalgamation of every society in the area. It was of military interest due to its central location in the Mediterranean and as a result, everyone conquered it at one time or another. Since control shifted from one country to another over the centuries, the culture retains aspects of both Europe and north Africa. We took the picture above and added it to the “About Us” link at the top of the blog. -Dave
MANY museums in Madrid, art and otherwise. These paintings are in the Thysssen Bornemisza art museum.
As I’m typing this, I can hear/have been hearing the constant roar from a soccer match at the Vicente Calderon Stadium – .75 miles away!! – Laura
Laura wanted me to spring for some bling but instead I sprung for some springs. -Dave
Jan 6 is a holiday here – Los Reyes Mogos. Translated into English – “everything will be closed or have reduced hours”. It didn’t stop many people, including us, from being out and about on another sunny day. No luck finding the stamp and mint museum (it likely would have been closed) so we settled for a beverage at Casa Carmencita.
“This mid 19th century taberna was famous in the early 1920s as a hangout of writers, artists and politicians. Its wood façade, elegant tiling and gas lamps add to its character.” The tile work was absolutely beautiful. Dave noted that the garlic-infused green olives (we love the gratis snacks!) were the best he’d had. (Kirken: you’d go nuts here!) We hope to find a few more of the old taverns, especially the one frequented by Ernest Hemingway.
But wait – yesterday, Jan 5 was Cabalgata de Reyes. Translated into English: HUGE Twelfth Night parade (semis pulling the floats) and crowds not to believed. The parade started at 6:30 p.m. and it was 8:00 when it finally reached the end of the route, where we jostled for a viewing spot at the barrier. Most of the people (us included) couldn’t actually see the parade so I surmise it’s just yet another excuse for kids to be out late! We left after the first few floats, which were very commercialized children’s characters, so guess we missed the ones that actually related to the religious meaning of the event, AND the fireworks. This 2013 video. gives a flavor, as does this second shorter one. Yup, we hit the jackpot and were here for the “biggest holiday in Spain”! Cheers – Laura
Fur coats (Paige!) are worn casually, though the temperatures really don’t warrant them. Fashion in general is several notches higher than in the states. Even those on a stroll to the market are dressed smartly. Sweats and athletic shoes are only seen on joggers. – Laura
For this trip we are trying to live within our retirement checks or stated another way, live for the same price we would at home. We are using the web site airbnb.com to find lodging. This site gives you the ability to search for bunches of places to stay and allows you to enter criteria to narrow down the search. We are using three criteria: 1) whole house 2) washer/dryer and 3) wifi. You can see all the candidate homes on a map and click on a home to see the description and all the included pictures. The airbnb vacation rentals are all homes/apartments/condos/rooms that people, in contrast to companies, are making available.
We type in what ever city we are interested in and look for a place that looks decent and is either walkable to most places or is on a bus or train line to get where we want to go.
The selection of “whole house” on airbnb also assure us we find places with a kitchen which is also key to keeping cost down. In general we plan to to eat two meals at home and one out every day.
We intend to stay in one place for at least 10 days. The longer you stay in most airbnd establishments the better price you get but also the longer you stay the more you get a feel for what life in a particular city is really like. The trade off of course is that you stay too long in either a city you don’t like, or a home you don’t like, and that you don’t see as many attractions over the course of a trip (in our case 4 months). On balance we are shooting for about 2 weeks every where we go.
I have included the picture of two wine bottles we bought in our neighborhood grocery store here in Madrid. I’m always on the search for the cheapest bottle of drinkable wine I can find. We bought two bottles one costing $1.38 and the other “expensive” wine was $3.90. Laura and I both preferred the $1.38 wine so it now replaces a previous cheap wine we like (in Malta several years back for $1.90). In fact bottled water costs more than bottled wine here in Madrid. – Dave