It’s hard to believe it’s been 15 years since we last spent time here.

Madrid is fabulous!  The old buildings are eye candy.  Food fantastic. First class museums and lush parks.  And this time of the year – tons of people.  It’s all remarkable.

*click photos to enlarge

In keeping with our routine we walked and walked and walked everywhere.  No metros to explore – only one to a train station outside the city to buy tickets which we could have purchased online, and no busses.

We hit the tops of the waves. A repeat of all the things we did 15 years ago.

Stunning is Patrick Blanca’s vertical garden wall – 78 feet tall containing 250 varieties of 15,000 plants.

It felt good to practice our Spanish and eat food different from Central Asia.

Fun story:  Bill occasionally puts one of his hearing aides in his pocket when it starts to bug him.  This time when we returned to our hotel the aid was missing.  It was assumed that he dropped it while taking his money out of his pocket but with it would be impossible to retrace our steps.

Days later we went to back to a bar, after viewing Picasso’s Guernica, where we had eaten on the day that Bill lost his hearing aid ONLY because every other restaurant in the area was full.

I decided to ask our waitress if they found a hearing aid.  She looked at us strangely and said I don’t think so – no.  The bartender heard the exchange and said Yes!  They found it on the sidewalk a few days ago.  What are the odds?  A crazy miracle for sure.

We found it interesting watching these street sellers walk up with a tarp full of knock off purses, bags, scarves, etc..  They cautiously open their bag, displaying wares and at a moments notice (police) can pull the cord which wraps up their contraband for a quick get away.  They looked right and left, constantly accessing of their situation while trying to make a buck.  The stress was apparent.

All in all it was fantastic being back.  We love Spain.  Preston met the love of his life here and it holds special meaning to all of us.  There’s more of Spain to come….