Ill-fated trips

Do you ever start a day with a list of errands and the drive to complete them all, only to have silly little snags stymie your chances of even crossing one item off your list? This happened to us a lot when we first moved to Madrid; I would wake up, energized and ready to accomplish the menial tasks that would help improve our daily life, only to return home with a sunken heart and a long list of pending tasks. It got better and we slowly learned when shops open and close, or the word for "measuring cup" in Spanish, but those first failed attempts are always the worst. Now that we have lived here for several months, we can successfully stroll home with our duties completed. But even now, we can have a botched day...



Spring has arrived in Spain! The flowers are blooming, the sun is shining, and you can almost walk outdoors with a jacket (but not really). In honor of the changing seasons, we decided to embark on some more exploration of Madrid. We all traveled together on the renfe to Escorial, a town an hour north of Madrid where a famous palace is nestled between the mountains-San Lorenzo de Escorial. It was built in the 1550s by Felipe II as a mausoleum to rest his father, King Carlos I of Spain. When Felipe was king, he ruled not only Spain, but also several parts of Italy, the Netherlands and the New World. The building is quite majestic in the mountainous landscape. Here are some shots. The last one is from one of the cute city streets.









We arrived in Escorial around 2pm and decided to have lunch before touring the famous edifice. After perusing around a few local places, we decided to settle into a small restaurant that had a menu special. Little did we know that we were going to remain in this restaurant for another 2 and a half hours! It was the worst service I had ever received in a restaurant: we first waited a half and hour before they took our order, then we had to wait another hour between our courses. I was sure that we were in the middle of a "Seinfeld" episode. We were all annoyed, but it was nice to speak in English, so we could carry on with our language and morbid sense of humor without disturbing anyone. We casually began to discuss burning the place down in order to vent our anger and have a laugh at our terrible misfortune. Even though we were all trying to improve our Spanish, we weren't completely confident enough to fully complain about the service, or lack thereof. Some other customers were nice enough to complain on our behalf as well. We finally received our bill and departed the restaurant close to 5pm.

We went to the palace entrance, only to discover that it closes at 5. Here's a picture of one in our group cursing our luck.



We returned to Madrid in a despondent mood. We had traveled an hour north of Madrid only to eat mediocre food and experience a terrible wait staff. It was such a disappointment; we had planned to travel to Escorial for weeks, and now we missed our opportunity to see the palace/monastery because we were at a short-staffed restaurant. Normally, I hate days like these, but the company and our jokes made it worthwhile.

The following day, we went to Quevedo in Madrid to meet up with our friends for some afternoon coffee. Here's a picture of the statue at the Quevedo metro stop.



Quevedo was a prominent Spanish poet in the 1600s. Most Americans have no idea who this man is, but he is regarded as one of the great writers of Spain alongside Cervantes and de Vega.



It was appropriate that we went to Cafe Literario, a small Spanish bookstore that serves lovely rich desserts. We indulged ourselves with chocolate-orange cheesecake and the purchase of some Spanish books. I am now the proud owner of the Lope de Vega play Fuenteovejuna and Cervantes's Don Quixote. Yes, I am probably not going to read these in Spanish, but at least I have them for my collection!

So, all in all, not a bad weekend!