Reluctantly, we parted ways with Rioja and headed toward Madrid. The 4-hour drive meandered through gorgeous, rolling countryside that ranged from forest to desert...
...until we hit Madrid traffic: an army of scooters and motorcycles and buses screaming around roundabouts before squirting into one-way narrow unnamed streets lined with posts that threatened to lop off our bumpers at every turn.
We made our way into the maze of tiny streets toward the car rental dropoff office, and as usual, our GPS cut out just as we neared our destination, and with a parade of honking & crazed taxi drivers right on our tail. By sheer luck we made a correct turn and found the office, only to discover there wasn't any parking in front....dripping with sweat, I said screw it and managed to squeeze the car between some posts and onto the sidewalk, partially blocking both cars & baby strollers, but by that point, I didn't care, which meant I was practically already a local. We were early, so waited for the office to open, then realized that the garage entry where I needed to return the car was up the hill of this busy one-way narrow street where I'd parked, so like a good Madridian, I got into the car, drove it off the sidewalk, and proceeded to back up the wrong way up the street, stopping traffic (during the chaos, one guy saw our French license plate and yelled to another driver in Spanish, "HE DOESN'T KNOW WHAT HE'S DOING, HE'S FRENCH!"), until I reached the garage entry, which I discovered to be a steep 60-degree incline. If you haven't tried doing reverse with a sloppy 4-cylinder diesel engine up a 60-degree grade with the garage walls practically touching both the passenger and driver doors, let me tell you, it is a brakes-smoking, fun-filled time! The car was freaked out by the time I got it to the top---the dashboard was lit up like a Christmas tree with lights indicating hot brakes, hot engine, and that I was stopped too close to a wall, but being in Madrid, I just smiled, inhaled the burnt exhaust, and parked it.
...until we hit Madrid traffic: an army of scooters and motorcycles and buses screaming around roundabouts before squirting into one-way narrow unnamed streets lined with posts that threatened to lop off our bumpers at every turn.
We made our way into the maze of tiny streets toward the car rental dropoff office, and as usual, our GPS cut out just as we neared our destination, and with a parade of honking & crazed taxi drivers right on our tail. By sheer luck we made a correct turn and found the office, only to discover there wasn't any parking in front....dripping with sweat, I said screw it and managed to squeeze the car between some posts and onto the sidewalk, partially blocking both cars & baby strollers, but by that point, I didn't care, which meant I was practically already a local. We were early, so waited for the office to open, then realized that the garage entry where I needed to return the car was up the hill of this busy one-way narrow street where I'd parked, so like a good Madridian, I got into the car, drove it off the sidewalk, and proceeded to back up the wrong way up the street, stopping traffic (during the chaos, one guy saw our French license plate and yelled to another driver in Spanish, "HE DOESN'T KNOW WHAT HE'S DOING, HE'S FRENCH!"), until I reached the garage entry, which I discovered to be a steep 60-degree incline. If you haven't tried doing reverse with a sloppy 4-cylinder diesel engine up a 60-degree grade with the garage walls practically touching both the passenger and driver doors, let me tell you, it is a brakes-smoking, fun-filled time! The car was freaked out by the time I got it to the top---the dashboard was lit up like a Christmas tree with lights indicating hot brakes, hot engine, and that I was stopped too close to a wall, but being in Madrid, I just smiled, inhaled the burnt exhaust, and parked it.
I won't lie: Madrid isn't my favorite. I'm not a fan of hot and muggy and stress. There is great history and scattered beauty....endless squares with statuaries to kings, yes, but they're sandwiched in-between comparatively unattractive & graffiti-strewn brick buildings that look ready to fall over. Like San Francisco, Madrid also has its own brand of homeless problems...while on a 2-story tour bus, we passed this guy, and even though we were on the top deck, could smell him from 20 feet away, no joke:
And maybe it was the temperature, but nobody looked happy to see us; the shopkeeps and people on the street looked positively miserable, and we had moments of that as well...I'll cop to the schaudenfreudian fun of watching angst-filled tourists struggling to drive the streets without getting plowed by a taxi or construction truck....
But there were high points:
A statue of (appropriately) Don Quixote of La Mancha:
The Puerta de Alcalá t Plaza de la Independencia, where Mr. King Carlos III built the city's newest gate in 1769:
A wide selection of delicious meats:
Plaza de Cibeles (c. 1777 and named after Ceres, the Roman goddess of nature, one of Madrid's favorite symbols):
Crosses, both religious and technological:
A man performing as a baby:
And finally, the "old town" area around our hotel, where we happened upon a lovely lesbian bar and downed our share of mojitos:
And then, it was off to the airport, where we only managed to lose 2 bags en route to Los Angeles, but gained what was easily one of the greatest vacations of my life to date, thanks in full to my partner in crime. ;)
xoxo
--s
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