Madrid - El Prado

We woke up late and had coffees, chocolate danish and smoked ham bocadillo at Cafe di Roma, right around the corner. Actually, before going out, we spent a good bit of time researching the next leg of our trip. Our original itinerary was to fly from Madrid to Vigo, then take the train down the coast to Porto, Coimbra, and then Lisbon. We've now decided that we are going to take a train directly to Lisbon instead, and spend 4 nights there and then fly to Barcelona. It was a very difficult decision as we really wanted to see more of Portugal, and Porto is supposed to be beautiful. However, we are feeling like we need to think about the amount of time we are going to have in May and June to see the scandinavian countries, England, Scotland and Ireland, and really wanted to try and do what we can to make sure we have time to experience those places. Also, the trip to Portugal is fairly long via train, and not as inexpensive as we had hoped via airplane, so that changed things too. Regardless, we are very excited to get to Lisbon. After our late breakfast, it was El Prado for the rest of the day. Admission was 6 EUR each, and we saw the entire collection. It was amazing to see all these famous works that we've studied in Art History classes by El Greco, Titian, Tintoretto, Valesquez, Goya, Reubens, Rafael and many many more including Roman sculptures dating BC. The amazing thing is that there is nothing protecting the works. They are literally just hanging on the walls, with nothing between you, and the work but a rope, and plenty of opportunity for someone to get right up next to the work. It was overwhelming to see so much important artwork, but we were very proud of ourselves for sticking it out the entire afternoon until we saw everything. We decided that as much as we appreciated the work, their historical and cultural significance, we wouldn't want any of it hanging on our walls...it was just not that kind of art. On the way back to our room, we stopped at the little market around the corner, and got some red wine, bread, cheese, and grapes. They kindly opened the bottle for us, and then we indulged for a bit back at the hotel. Perfectly dreamy. Just the kind of evening we spoke of when trying to imagine what kinds of things we'd like to be doing during this trip. The clock was ticking, and we still had to run up to the Chamartin Train Station to buy our train ticket reservations for Lisbon. We had no problem getting the right Metro, and it took us to within a few blocks of the train station. The clerk explained the various trenhotel options to us, and then ultimately, we decided on the cheapies, and will hope that we can sleep sitting up, instead of in one of the nice all meals included trenhotel rooms. After buying our reservations, we metroed back to Puerto Del Sol, and went out for some nighttime fun, turning down offer after offer for entrance to the dance clubs, and instead, went to a little lesbian bar where we had some delicious smoked trout, and cheese tapas, a beer for me, and a Coke for Vee. The cigarette smoke got to be too much for me, so we left for the Irish Pub across the street from our hotel, where I had been wanting to go. They extorted 7.5 EUR out of us for a draft Heineken and a Pepsi, and after finishing up, we quickly exited. I was in the mood for some more fresh bread, but our local market was closed. It's now 1:40 am, and I'm heading to bed. Another fantastic day.