Free Means Free

Day 2 in Madrid is complete and we are really feeling all the walking we have done already. Everything here is so close in proximity, so, we usually walk everywhere since it is the fastest method of travel. We didn't do too much today, but it was still a productive one and filled with laughs and smiles. The world-famous Prado Museum was originally our plan for the day, but since it is so esteemed and famous, entrance prices were expensive. However, we found out that on Sunday's the museum is free from 5-7PM, so, we decided to explore the city until 5 and then head on over.

After stopping into various shops along our walk, we decided to grab some lunch at a place called Twin Pizza. The huge difference of dining in the United States and in Spain is that the waiters/waitresses don't exactly seat you or come to you to get your order. Instead, we have to initiate them and bring our order up to the counter. In some of the fancier restaurants, they will seat you and come take your orders, but for the ones just along the street, it is on you to make sure you get what you want. The pizza was very good and it held us over until dinner later in the evening. Before dinner, we planned to go over to the Prado Museum and take advantage of the free admission window. However, we ran into a slight problem upon arriving to this massive museum. No, it wasn't that we read the day or times wrong about the free admission, no, it wasn't closed and no, we didn't end up at the wrong museum. Instead, it appeared as though the entire city of Madrid was also well aware of this free admission window and a line stretched from the front entrance all the way down the stairs and then wrapped around the side of the museum and spanned the entire length. Since the free window was only 2 hours, we decided against jumping in line and testing our luck. Kenzie's friend from college told us awhile back that the museum is so large that you could literally spend an entire day in their and probably not even see it all. As we quickly found out, free means free!

We made an agreement that at least one night we would treat ourselves to a fancier dinner and dress up a little. That night just so happened to be tonight and we decided to go to Garbo which was a Mediterranean restaurant we walked by earlier in the day. To our pleasant surprise, everyone there spoke some English and we both understood everything. The food was very good and reasonably priced compared to places we would go to in Chicago. Thankfully, there was no miscommunication or language barrier when it came time to pay for our dinner. The waitress simply swiped our card and away we went into the night. After dinner we went on the hunt for gelato since we both wanted something sweet. It took finding a KFC with free wifi, but we ended up going to a small, tucked away gelato place not far from our hotel. All the food today was very good and it was nice to try a variety of meals to get a taste for how it all is over here.

One other thing that we have noticed while in Spain, the locals here walk so slow. Now, I get it, Europeans are generally in no hurry and, opposed to Americans, like to take their time and casually get to their destination. Honestly though, they walk so slow and then out of nowhere decide to just stop in the middle of a busy sidewalk to look around or talk to someone. It is as if we are speed walking throughout the entire city, but we are just going at our normal pace. We joked today and said that if we walked like the locals do, our day would take many hours longer because it would take us forever to get anywhere! Tomorrow we will go and tour the Royal Palace which should be really fun and then on Tuesday, we are off to Porto, Portugal! Adios!

~Andrew & Kenzie