A weekend in Madrid before going to Estacion Inglesa, Aug. 23 - 25, 2014

I flew to Madrid via an indirect but less costly route, Phoenix to Chicago to Frankfurt to Madrid.  I left home about 9:00 a.m. Thursday and arrived at my hotel at 5:00 p.m. Friday, some 23 hours door to door.  I napped some on each of the three flights, but nothing that resembled a good nights sleep.

After checking in and taking a short rest, about 6:45 I headed out to Parque de Santander for the 7:30 gathering of the Friday Evening English Speaking Group also known as La Tienda de las Lanas.  My long time acquaintance, Richard Morley, is the emcee - I have known him for more than 15 years.  He expected maybe six people and only one woman - it ended being about 15 people including at least seven women.  Good discussions were had by all.  I learned a new satirical term for America's obsession with fast food - S.A.D. for Standard American Diet.

 

 

 

 

 

Saturday morning, after a long and relaxed time for reading and eating at the hotel's breakfast buffet, I set out for a visit to the Casa de la Moñeda, also known as the House of Money or the Mint Museum.  On the way, I passed the WiZink Center https://www.esmadrid.com/en/tourist-information/wizink-center  This center caught my eye with unusual architecture.  It is a large sports and event center.

This was only a block away from Casa de la Moñeda.

Art and architecture are always big in Madrid.  The museum has a special exhibit about Collecting and the Genesis of Museums with materials from the Peralada Castle in Catalunya, the Spanish province that includes Barcelona.  

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They also had materials from the library at Peralada.

 

And they had a selection of items from the Museum of Glass.

 

 

The rest of the museum still has their longtime exhibits of money from using beans to stones to coins in Ancient Greece to coins and paper currency from Spain and European countries up to the current Euro coins and paper money.  They have coin making machines from past and present, as well as the history of the Spanish Postal Service and postage stamps.

 

Later, I walked and explored the area.  Finally, I found an outside cafe in the shade for a beer and to finish reading The Big Burn by Timothy Egan.  This tells the story of the biggest forest fire in our history, in August of 1910.  This led to the creation of the US Forest Service and national forests.  After finishing the book, I had an Ensalata el Jefe - this was much like the chicken chopped salad we get at the Beatitude's Campus Bistro.

The hotel is in a good neighborhood, across the street is a Mercedes Benz dealer and around the corner is a police station.

Sunday was a quiet day with exercising at the hotel gym, walking, reading and relaxing on the quiet, covered roof top lounge at the hotel.

And I did a load of laundry at the local laundromat.