Europe Day 26 of 59, Madrid to Barcelona

Our last morning in Madrid. It seemed to make sense to share what I have started every day with...

Iced coffee and a vanilla y chocolate-chip muffin. I love iced coffee on a hot day. When I get home I'm thinking maybe I'll plan ahead and brew coffee and then put in a pitched in the refrigerator.

After the morning Starbucks run, it was all about getting to the airport. I assume we were just lucky, but the Madrid airport was incredibly quiet. No lines anywhere. We walked straight through security. When compared to the average airport experience it was as pleasant as a foot massage.

Madrid's modern, attractively designed airport.

Nerd Corner. (Skip the next paragraph if tech bores you. Seriously, skip to the words, "Welcome back.")

Many of you heard that I upgraded my iPhone to the 3.0 software and lost all of my music, and then called out for help on Facebook for people to email their favorite songs. (I also had David Scharf upload 12 key albums to his website for me to ftp.) Anyway... nerds understand that I received lots of great music but in different file formats and different bit rates. I waited until today to load up the iPhone with music, and this morning in the car ride to the airport I started converting everything that wasn't a mp3 at 128 kbps to that format. (Extensive testing shows that earbuds don't need anything better than that.) In the airport I did some more converting, deleting the old files as I went, and around 15 minutes before boarding time the task was complete, I sync'd the iPhone and bam! - minutes later there was 11.5 hours of music for me to shuffle on the flight. To me, this is a marvel of modern technology. With a single click I was able to ask people worldwide to send me music, many did, and then while in moving vehicles and public areas I was able to take what they sent and convert it to my preferred digital format and load it on my portable music player -- which is also a phone, camera, and web browser. In my book, that is about as kickass as it gets.

Welcome back, non-techy types.

Barcelona from the sky.

Our driver did not hesitate to find a pen and paper, while driving, and start writing down restaurant recommendations. While driving on a highway. I had to take this picture, to prove it to you. This car is moving.

We got to our hotel, the Hotel Arts Barcelona. It's part of the Ritz-Carlton chain, which means it meets the standards I would have never had had I never met Barbie, but I did meet her and I secretly do.

The view from our room towards the city. See the Torre Agbar? The tall building left of center that looks like a tube of lipstick? Why am I forgetting to point? Want to read the funniest Wikipedia sentence ever about a building? As a result of its unusual shape, the building is known by several nicknames, such as "el supositori" (the suppository), "l'obús" (the shell) and some more scatological ones. Closer pictures are sure to come. The real question is will I continue to think of it as a lipstick tube or will the suppository image take hold.

The view from our room towards the sea. I really should have taken pictures of the room when we first arrived. Sorry. It's modern and very, very posh.

Travelling with Barbie means you get upgraded to Club Level, which means we get this lounge on the 33rd floor. (We're right below it on the 32nd.) They even had us come up here to a separate reception desk to check in away from the riff raff. You know, these Rtiz-Carton's are rife with riff raff. Free drinks and snacks all freaking day in El Club.

The man who brought up our bags surpassed the driver on the "I'm a native of Barcelona let me tell you where to eat" meter. He then picked up our phone and got us a reservation at an up and coming restaurant that he insisted we had to try.

The unassuming exterior of Restaurant Embat.

The welcoming, unpretentious interior of Restaurant Embat.

We went ahead and chose the testing menu, since our goal was simply to try what the chef does best. Four courses for €40. ($60.) The light was not great for pictures, but I am still going to share every plate with you.

They started us with an "aperitive" of Parmesan Biscuits. You cannot really know me and not know that parmesan cheese is my favorite substance on Earth. So far, so good.

A second "aperitive" of, get this, potato foam with anchovy eggs and apple. It was delicious. There were dark anchovie eggs at the bottom. It wasn't photogenic, but it tasted great.

The first course was, "Scallop with pork double chin and celery." Yes, you read that correctly. (Upside down pic. Hate me for it.)

The second course was, "Truffle duck cannelloni." Almost licked the plate on this one.

Third, "Sea bass with cous-cous and cockles."

Fourth, "Pork shoulder with aubergine and figs cooked in red wine." No joke, this was the best pig meat I have ever tasted.

This is how every plate looked after I was through but this shot is the only empty plate that makes the blog. Between you and me, I like the composition of the silverware.

For dessert, "Lime sorbet with basil-flavored soup, ginger and green apple." I wish the lighting had been better. This dessert had a bit of lime flavored sorbet in the center, with shredded apple and ginger over it, and after it was set in front of us she poured the basil-flavored soup around it. There was also a dollop of cream in there. It was, honestly, amazing. Just a touch sweet, just a touch tart, with the kick of ginger. Delicious and refreshing, I had never tasted these flavors before and, dios mio, I may never again.

Petit-fours.

The hostess/waitress had the casual manner that made us think she was the chef's wife, managing the front while he worked in the kitchen. I had been typing onto the iPhone what each course was, but it was hard to understand and remember. We loved it so much that we asked to see the menu again so that I could correct what I had typed, and she asked, "In English?" We said yes and she disappeared for a while. When she came back, she had printed out the menu of what we were served for us to take home. This was not the menu we saw, she went back there and copied/pasted for us. How great is that?

How happy does she look?

And thus ends our first night in Barcelona. Yes, all we did was eat dinner and go back to the hotel.

Europe Day 25 of 59, Madrid

Excitement! We awoke on Day 25 to the sound of a bullhorn. Yes, a full-fledged political demonstration not only walked by but took up a permanent position below our window. We went down and one sign I read said, "No more money for the banks." Not too hard to figure out what they are angry about... considering most people in the USA are not too happy about the same issue.

My brave wife, photographing protesters. She is brave. We hadn't read the signs yet.

When you hit a place every morning for coffee and muffins, you realize that it belongs on the blog. By the way, Monique is absolutely responsible for this ritual being part of our lives. In a good way.

For our last full day in Madrid, we decided to hop on that double-decker bus thing. We had pretty much walked 15 minutes in every direction, and although we love metros this seemed like a good way to hit the key landmarks.

When I took this picture, I was relieved. You have no idea how many inadequate pictures I took of La Puerta de Alcalá before this one.

Palacio de las Comunicaciones again, from the top of a double-decker bus. Nice perspective, no?

The Temple of Debod. Okay, Egypt gave this temple as a gift to Spain in 1968. I think that makes this the first ever Egyptian artifact that I have seen that was not stolen. I wanted to think that Spain received this gift with a card that said, "Thank you for not being Italy, England or France." But according to Wikipedia, Egypt gave this a sign of gratitude for the help provided by Spain in saving the temples of Abu Simbel. Bummer.

This is the pond behind the Temple of Debod. This woman pulled off her skirt and proceeded to act as if she was at the beach. Would you have not taken a picture?

Palacio Real. And, seriously, this is a real palace. I think you know that Barbie is one well travelled Palace expert. We took the tour of this palace and she said, "This is the most amazing palace I've ever seen."

Palacio Real inside the courtyard. From Wikipedia: The palace also has the distinction of being the largest royal palace in Western Europe in size, with over a combined area of over 135,000 m² and more than 2,800 rooms. See, I told you it was impressive.

We first walked into the armory, and Barbie began to take a picture and the guard stormed up to her with his chest puffed out saying, "No no no no." She apologized and said she thought the rule was no flash, which we thought was true. Anyway, when there were no guards around I took this pic out of spite. The armory was quite amazing, I must say. Too bad I cannot share it.

At the entrance to the main doors of the Palacio Real, Barbie impersonates a guard.

You walk into the Palacio real and head up a staircase that is simply amazing. The decor literally knocks you off of your feet.

After this one a guard told me no photos allowed, and I decided to give up. Ironic that they don't seem to realize that allowing pictures will encourage people to visit. If you saw a glimpse of what we saw, everything from an entirely porcelain room to a Chinese themed room, you would visit for certain. Now you have to take our word for it. (Thank God they didn't have this stupid rule at the Reina Sofia, no?)

Outside the palace is La Plaza Oriente, with this statue of Philip IV.

Next to the Palacio Real on finds the Almudena Cathedral. Because when you have the biggest royal palace in Western Europe, you damn well better have a bigass church to pray in next door.

La Puerta de Toledo. Easy to translate, that's for sure. I really do love this having a door to the city thing.

We stopped off at Plaza Mayor for lunch.

The paella was fantastic.

We happened across El Corte Ingles, Spain's super-charged department store. When Barbie approached the MAC counter and this gentleman helped her, I had to take this pic. He made Bruno seem masculine.

Tío Pepe! Did you know that Tio Pepe is the best selling brand of sherry in the world? And that the Tío Pepe sign at Puerta del Sol in Madrid is considered a landmark? Me either. Check wikipedia if you doubt these truths.

We went back to the hotel and cooled our heels for 15 minutes or so, and then headed to the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, which sits across the street from our hotel. Interesting history to this museum. The short version is this: super-wealthy landed aristocrat collects art, then his son collects art, then this son marries Miss Spain and introduces her to art collecting, then the former Miss Spain twists the son's arm and makes him donate the collection to the state. I'd say that makes her an excellent person, because the art collection at the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza is out of this world impressive.

No pictures allowed inside the Matisse show, but I was allowed to take this one. Nice way to enter a temporary exhibit, no?

The main lobby of the museum. I quite liked the pink decor. Apparently the Queen, Miss Spain 1961, chose it. Salmon?

No pics allowed at the permanent collection, either. So these pics you see are when I pulled out my iPhone and when trying to send a text I accidentally pressed the touchscreen in a sequence that caused a picture to be taken.

Georgia O'Keeffe. If you fail to see parts of a woman's anatomy in her work, you are not looking at it properly.

Aren't these rooms lovely. This is a fantastic museum. Amazing how I keep trying to text and accidentally taking pictures. Weird how that works sometimes.

The top floor uses the roof to create a great space.

Back in the real world, we crossed the street and I pointed out this classic Mini. Then we started taking pics and the car's owner rolled down her window and smiled a huge smile for us. She must absolutely love the attention her car gets. She was very sweet, you could tell.

We got back on the double-decker for the other tour, that of "Modern Madrid."

On the double-decker, we went past this stadium. This is where Real Madrid plays. I figure I know enough futbol fanatics that this pic should be included.

Okay. Now I finally got the right picture of La Puerta de Alcalá. Man, was that difficult from moving vehicles or what?

Another repeat. Hmm, what am I thinking?

Back in our room, I hear all sorts of honking and I look out the window and, no joke, at least a thousand bicycles are going by. I couldn't get a better picture than this, but looking down the street the other way it was just a sea of them coming towards this roundabout. Pretty awesome, the people of Madrid.

We decided to ride the double-decker at night. They charge you for a 24 hour period, and it's a fun ride, so why not? You know those building's that you've seen more than once? Get ready to see them again, but at night.

If you look, directly above Starbucks, you can see Barbie's clothes hanging in the window. Coffee was spilled, clothes were cleaned. How appropriate is it to see her white clothes hanging above the store where the coffee that stained them was purchased?

Dude, what can I say? I'm a Puerta fan.

And a post office fan. Yes, this used to be a post office.

Palacio Real at night.

Almudena Cathedral. At night.

Puerta de Toledo. At night. Seems like a good place to end for the day.