Madrid4 – Wednesday – NOT Toledo

Our first major alteration of plans.  Toledo was supposed to be our destination today.  Train trip out of half an hour.  Then bus around Toleda historic district, supposedly all walkable, then back.  But the kids were getting worn out, and Zeke had spied something he wanted to do on the bus tour.  ‘Experience the future' was the claim, and we had no clue what it was.  Guessing it was a Science Museum.  After much asking, including walking back to the far side of the Prado to the bus tour’s Lost and Found,

we were satisfied that it must be the Telefonica bulding.  An actual store.  Given that it was more or less on the way to the Palace, we rolled forward.  Past the piazza that we were getting quite familiar with, Neptune’s fountain where we got Theo’s Bazuba soccer horn.  Then we followed maps in more or less the right direction, Kate asking a time or two for ‘Telefonica’.  One annoying thing about walking the old district.  The streets are narrow and the traffic so thick that they must practially limit the number of crosswalks, so we found ourselves going further up or further down the street where we’d rather have gone straight across.  Even the locals seemed to majorly obey the crosswalks.  We were now definitely in the downtown district.  People dressed to impress and a few ladies dressed certainly to be looked at.  But most dressed simply smartly.  We noticed too, very few overweight Spanish.  Most fit and trim. Must be all that walking!  We found our way to Telefonica and sheepishly made our way in, knowing full well now that it was a business that was in the business to sell electronics, and we weren’t buying.  Cell phones, flat screens, 3D TVs, laptops, playstations.  You name it.  I stumbled into a lady who spoke english and asked if I wanted to play a game on their large six foot tall touch screen flat panel.   It was a Western themed shoot the bad guy game, so I called Theo over knowing it was right up his venue.  He killed a few bad guys, and all the kids tried the same.  And the lady introduced us to another lady that ended up leading us, as a personal tour guide, through the store.  And helping the kids through 7 different kiosks where they needed to solve puzzles, and finally get their prize.  I’m still not certain if we imposed on the ladies, or if that was their actual job?? They were all excited to get their prize, a small cloth backpack with a T-shirt inside.  On the way out, we walked by a room where a college age man was in a big gerbil ball that was held in place.  He was wearing a full headgear covering his eyes and a computer screen was next to the gerbil ball displaying his virtual world to others who were watching along with him.  The language barrier didn’t allow me to figure out what exactly was going on, but we learned that we were not to go in there and that we weren’t to take pictures.  I suspect they were putting finishing touches on a Virtual reality prototype that allowed you to walk/run through virtual worlds.  When the man looked up, the screen image went skyward.  It looked fantastic and I can’t wait to see it hit the real market. Sorry no photos for you.

We made it back out and decided it was time to eat.  Spain’s big meal is in the middle of the day.  With our small fruit breakfast and all the walking, we decided it would be a good day to sit for a big Spanish meal.  Kate had read up on places to eat in our guide book and also had read of areas to stay out of.  Evidently we were skirting those areas as we saw a few questionable folk parading around some of the central squares.  Our restaurant was just down a little back road.  Quite well disguised.  Upon entry I thought this is way too fancy and expensive for us, with well-set tables and way too many staff standing at the ready.

It turned out to be very pleasant with the waiter guiding us to 5 meals instead of 6 because the serving portions were so large.  And he was right.  We were all full even into the evening.  All was very good, with one exception in my mind.  the salmon Zeke had ordered was not.  Way overcooked and mushy.  Overall a great experience however.

Then off to find the palace of the King and Queen of Spain.  Yes, Spain still has these.  On the way we hit the true tourist district with all the trinket shops and we found Zeke a David Villa jersey that he’d wanted to buy with his money.  Within sight of the palace we bumped into a street performer singing with his guitar.  He treated us to a couple of songs, the last being ‘Is she really going out with him’.  Not a fantastic voice, but very distinctive and very good.  Perhaps it was just the comfort of hearing American music in English, but I would’ve pulled up a chair and listened for another hour or so.  But alas, we had to move on.  The big draw at the palace, at least for our boys, was the Armory.  A large two floor collection of armor for humans and horses and even one dog!!! There was armor for kids (evidently toy armor for the very rich) and shields and ancient guns and huge long lances.  No photos were allowed inside, so I can offer only this photo of us in the courtyard. 

Janie has a few words to say about the palace…

There were about twenty rooms that we were able to look at the palace we looked at a lot of them and I thought they were over the top. They were almost to decorative, there were a lot of paintings in the rooms, the frames were very interesting. I also thought the clocks were very interesting. There was so much around it that you could barely even see the clock itself.

Kate read that the King and Queen choose now to live in town at some regal condo and only come out to the palace for formal affairs.  One interesting tidbit that I was able to remember…  Napolean Bonaparte occupied the palace for awhile.  His brother Juan (or something like that) ordered the original silverware be melted down to finance the war.  We saw the “modern” 17th century silverware.  I liked the armory best and definitely wanted to get back to the bookshop to buy something on it. 

On our rush out of the palace, Maeve asked whether it was time to see the King.  We all laughed.  Kate told the guard en Espanol, what our cute 4 year old had said, and the guard laughed as well.  He said blah blah blah Duerme.  Sleeping.  (Thanks Sean for explaining that word to me).  And I laughed again. We needed a quick stop at the Farmacia (the pharmacy).  And quick it was, as they were only open for 5 more minutes.  Still that was enough.  Just enough time to see the uncountable names of spices and herbs and others all neatly shelved and labeled in ancient (and probably near priceless) containers.  Also saw the oven room with the glass ware that they boiled their concoctions in. We rushed onto the bookstore, only to hear abierto.  Closed.  DRATT!!

Right next to the palace was the crypt of one of the Apostles or possibly Christopher Columbus.  We weren’t sure.  Though I think I would’ve read about Columbus before hand… And even one of the 12 apostles should’ve shown up in my research… So not really sure who was buried here.  Maybe a minor saint.  Still the draw for me was the Cathedral.  Undoubtedly a few royal weddings had occurred here.  I dropped a few Euro in the offertory box at the entrance and we were in.

The kids were reminded that this was a church and church behavior was expected. 

It wasn’t as ornate as I’d expected.  Immense with marble everywhere.  And a large organ (see picture) and huge golden altar.  I saw the opportunity to light a candle for my mother, and was surprised to see that the candles were electric!  Oh well, it still counts right?  1` Euro… d’oh.  Dropped my last Euro in the offertory at the entrance.  Luckily, on the way out I found a cheaper 20 cent Euro electric candle to light.  Hopefully that still helps her ;-).

We plotted a course for home.  Much shorter than the route here as we had a near direct road running straight toward the Attoche train station.  On the way we found a nice public plaza to sit at.  I found the buzz of conversation around us in a language I could easily tune out, to be a very pleasant backdrop to the fun adventure we’d had.

The square was mostly for the locals, with a few of us tourists sprinkled in.  Kids, including one naked baby, were playing in the fountain behind us as we drank and ate a bit.  The kids decided to get in on the action.  We parents made them promise to stay dry, and Theo in particular promised to hop over the water and not get wet.  OK, I said.  If you get wet, absolutely no piggy back ride home. 

I definitely enjoyed walking home without Theo on my back!  Unfortunately Kate put Maeve on my shoulders because she was barefoot and my master plan was foiled yet again.  I thought, can’t she put her shoes back on?  At the same time, I simply enjoyed having her babble and sing above me on the walk home.

Theo ended up entertaining himself nearly the whole way home playing ‘soccer’ with an aluminum can. It didn’t seem to be bothering others too greatly, and in fact a few people played along, so we let it go.  With Theo you have to pick your battles, I know there’s parents out there who understand what I mean. 

He arrived back at the hotel happy.  Only a couple of pedestrians seemed to be annoyed by his antics.