Madrid & Toledo

My parents came to visit Spain so we met them in Madrid and spent a few days exploring the area!  This was my first long distance experience on Renfe, the train system here in Spain (which, if you're trying to use their website, God Bless you, try the app instead!) and the trip was incredibly easy!  So much better than driving and about the same price as a flight from any of our nearby airports, pluuuus you can pack your own food and wine!  Bonus!

El Retiro Park 

So initial thoughts on Madrid: holy moly it's HOT in the summertime, the food is amazing and diverse, and the vibe of the city is pretty indie and surprisingly rough around some of it's edges.  But in general I thoroughly enjoyed our stay!

Standing in the gardens outside of the Royal Palace

We took the train into Atocha and stayed in a nearby AirBnB in Lavapies, which was only about a 15 minute walk away from the train station and pretty hip!  There were a ton of little corner markets, street art, and super hippie pop-up street markets.

Views inside of the Royal Palace

We spent quite a bit of time riding the hop-on-hop-off bus, I'm a sucker for these for the views, quick and easy way to feel out the city and the highlights, and the free history lessons around the way.  Some of our top spots we saw were the El Retiro Park ... HUGE grounds with lots of statues, a huge water feature in the middle you can rent paddle boats in, and all sorts of people exhibiting weird talents to make money.  We also enjoyed seeing the Royal Palace of Madrid ... great garden, interiors, furniture, and a multi-million dollar Stradivarius collection!  We also found a great escape room and a variety of cute little bars in Lavapies!

Some of our favorite food spots were the Tai Pei Bar, where we found great ramen and appetizers, Taberna Mas Al Sur, great appetizers and italian food, and Tinto y Tapas Bar, amazing open-faced sandwiches and pizza!

Toledo, Spain ... just a quick (40 minute) train ride from Madrid!

Overall, while Madrid was cool, my favorite part of our trip was a day trip by train to Toledo.  Toledo is a super cute, rustic, and truly "spanish" feeling town full of cute little shops, decorated streets, a lovely cathedral, and soooo many "man of la mancha" references!  We all truly loved walking around the old hilly city while sipping on Spanish wine.

Street views in Toledo