The capital not only provides visitors with a cosmopolitan, fun, exciting and cultural city, the region also contains beautiful, mountainous countryside and some smaller towns, such Alcala de Henares, the birth place of Migeuel de Cervantes, and San Lorenzo del Escorial with its famous monastery. 

We spent 5 days in Madrid and it wasn't enough.  This vibrant and happening city is clean, friendly and a easy to get around using the metro.  We were able to get to all the places we wanted to see quickly.

Our first night was timed just right so we could catch a Real Madrid Football game.  It was a playoff game against a team, that hasn't won yet.    The Santiago Bernabeu stadium was electric, everyone was ready to party.  The street was filled with supporters of both teams and plenty of drinking in the street.  Inside the game started and the girl was reacting to every play and cheer of the crowd.  She clapped when others clapped. She jumped up when there was a goal.   By the beginning of the 2nd 1/2 and the score was 4 - 1, we started to talk with the people around us.   After a while people were watching the girl  react instead of watching the game.  We would look back to see a replay in the box seats behind us and the people were laughing at the Girl's reaction.

We spent a day relaxing and working at the apartment.  We were a bit worn out from the days of travel and busy schedule we had gotten a little sick.  We stayed in the Lavapies district.  It was ok just full of Indian restaurants and people yelling in the street.  We plan to stay in other areas next time.

The next few days was spent with a friend who lives in Madrid.  She was originally from New York and then Florida.  She showed us around town and gave us tips about wine drinking.   We had a wonderful time wandering around checking out the city and meeting the people.  We also enjoyed hanging out talking at the bar.

One of the people we met was a friend's friend who invited us to dinner the next day.  It was lovely and we came back for lunch the next day.  They wished us well on our journey and we made plans to visit Spain for a month next time.  We jumped a train in the evening for our 3 hour trip to Barcelona.