May 8, 2018: Exploring Madrid with Greg
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We docked in Barcelona this morning, and Fred, myself, Greg, John Lambert, and John Toohey have gotten a taxi to the Barcelona Central Station for our train ride to Madrid. The other three guys will be taking a third cruise back across the Atlantic to New York City, but their cruise does not leave until May 9th, so they have decided to come to Madrid with us, spend an evening and a day, and then return to Madrid.

The Train Ride from Barcelona to Madrid

When we were planning our trip, we investigated flying from Barcelona to Madrid, but in Europe, it is almost always easier to go by train, as every city has a central station that is just a taxi ride from anywhere in town.

Greg had found a livery service online yesterday on the ship and was able to arrange for a taxi large enough to carry the five of us and our luggage from the dock to Barcelona Sants (the main train station). Greg, Fred, and I got off the ship early, but John and John were late, so we had to wait for them for twenty or thirty minutes, but by the time they came out of the cruise ship terminal building, our driver and car had arrived.

We were indeed able to get all our stuff into the large vehicle (no mean feat), and we headed off to the train station.

(On the last page for our cruise I talked about the taxi ride over to the train station, which simply took us over the bridge to the new cruise ship docks and then pretty much straight through the early morning streets of Barcelona to the station.)

The taxi brought us into the underground parking area for the station, dropping us at a place that holds luggage. Greg, John, and John were only going to be in Madrid for a day, so they didn't want to haul all their stuff there and back, so for a small fee they were able to leave it right at the train station so that when they returned, they'd be able to claim it and take another taxi back to the cruise ship port for their third cruise leg.

Me On the Train Platform in Barcelona

I would like to be able to say that all five of us were on the same train to Madrid, but due to a snafu online a few days earlier, we weren't. When Greg told me which train he thought would be best, I went online to try to book tickets for Fred and myself but there was some kind of problem with either the site or with Paypal, and I never could get my payment to process.

By the time I was able to ask Greg about how he did his (and discover what it was that I was doing wrong), there were no more seats left on his train. So, as it turned out, Greg, John, and John left on a train at about 9AM while Fred and I had to wait another hour and a half for a different train that took a different routing.

Fred On the Train Platform in Barcelona

I think that Greg went via a more direct route than we did (as online there was about an hour's difference in the travel time between his routing and ours).

When Fred and I said goodbye to Greg and the Johns, we made plans to meet them at their hotel in Madrid in time to go to dinner together. That part of the plan did work out fine, and we were able to hook back up with them about 6PM at their hotel in Madrid.

So we didn't see them again until the evening in Madrid when we met up for dinner. But, eventually, Fred and I were down on the train platform waiting for our train to arrive.

After you do a bit of traveling on Europe's long-distance trains, you come to understand that one train platform looks much like another, and that in most cities, these stations are entirely underground. For example, if I were to show you an aerial view of Barcelona Sants (which I thought of doing), all you would see is a big building; you wouldn't see any train tracks at all. Usually, the tracks don't come up into the daylight until you are well out of the city center.

I think that Greg's train took a more direct route than ours did. Although the stop we made to change trains did consume some extra time, it certainly wasn't an hour. So either they followed our route but were on a more express train, or they took a more direct one.

But our route took us first down the Spanish Coast to Valencia, and even though the skies were overcast and the weather kind of crappy, Fred was able to get a few pictures along this part of the route:

(Click on Thumbnails to View)

Riding on trains is still an unusual occurrence for me, so whenever I get on one it's like something new, and I have the urge to take a photograph or two. (Of course, the locals are blase about train travel, as they do it all the time, so I never see any of them treating it as an experience.) During our ride down to Valencia, I took one picture of the interior of our car. Fred and I had seats by a table, which was nice, because I could set up my laptop and do stuff.

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We changed trains in Valencia, and then our new train headed northwest, away from the coast. It became apparent very quickly that the dismal, overcast weather we'd been riding through was just along the coast, for quickly after leaving Valencia the weather cleared up and we had a fair-weather, blue sky the rest of the way to Madrid.

The change in the weather made the countryside come alive, and Fred began taking lots of pictures. (He was sitting looking forward by the window, so he could see good opportunities for photographs coming up.

In putting this page together, I wanted to add a selection of these photographs to show you the wide variety of landscapes that we rode through on our way to Madrid, and so you can look at them quickly (if you want to) I have put them in a slideshow, which is at left.

As usual, move through the pictures using the little arrows in the lower corners, and track your progress using the reference numbers in the upper left. Enjoy the scenery between Valencia and Madrid!

Our Arrival in Madrid

When we got to the Atocha Station in Madrid, we were focused on finding the condo that I'd engaged months before online, and we were trying to follow the directions that the owner, Cipri Arquero, had texted to me just a few days before. That's why we didn't keep our cameras out to take pictures.

I had a general idea in which direction we needed to walk to get to the condo, bu tone of the problems with underground railway stations is that when you come up above ground, there are few indications as to what direction is what. I knew we needed to head west, but I had no idea which way that was.

Schlepping our luggage behind us, we came up from the platforms and located a tourist kiosk. When it came our turn, I asked the young lady to help me find the way to the condo, as I did have the address. She was very helpful and could now point in the general direction that we needed to go. She also told us the easiest way to get out of the station (although, as it turned out, a less-easy way would have been much shorter in the long run.

We came out of the station on its eastern side, and since we had to go west, we had to pull our luggage along the wide sidewalk all the way around the north end of the station to a crosswalk that would take us to the north side of Rondo de Atocha, the street we would need to take west to the condo.

The station was very busy, and we had to be careful not to let our roller luggage run into people- both inside and outside the station. The sidewalks were very busy too, as is much more common in European cities than in American ones, so we had to be careful outside, too.

Once we were on the north side of the Rondo de Atocha, it was smooth sailing down the street towards the street the condo was on. Well, not exactly smooth, as there were a fair number of curbs and stuff for our rollers to traverse. It was also, as I said, a busy street, so we were trying to be courteous as we pulled our luggage along.

On the way down to the condo, we did pass a number of small grocery stores, so we made a mental note of where they were so we could come later and get a few things (since the condo had a kitchen and all the equipment).

Calle Amparo, the street on which the condo was located, was about a half mile from the train station, and by the time we got there, we were very glad we'd bought new roller luggage!

When I'd last texted Cipri from the train, we had set a time for him to meet us outside the building where his condo was located, and even though Fred and I took twenty minutes longer to get there that we'd thought it might, Cipri was waiting for us as promised.

The building Cipri's condo is in was an older but renovated building with a central atrium. He gave us keys and took us in via the front door, down a short hall and out into and across the atrium. The stairway up to his condo (very narrow) was on the other side, so we had to be careful hauling our stuff up to the third floor.

Cipri showed us how to work the locks, and took us into the apartment. I think I will save the pictures of the condo itself until the page for our last day here (May 10th). Suffice it to say here that is was very spacious (especially compared to the ship cabin we've been living in for a month), and there was everything we needed. Cipri showed hus how to get onto the WIFI and Internet, exchanged all his local contact information with us, and told us about how to leave the keys for him when we left. We also discussed getting to the airport, and Cipri said that he should call ahead and arrange a cab to pick us up, which he did. So we were all set.

After Cipri left, we had time to relax for a while before texting Greg and arranging to meet them at their hotel- right back up by the train station.

Dinner in Madrid

We'd texted Greg and planned to meet in the lobby of their hotel at six-thirty. They were staying at a place just northeast of the Central Station where we'd arrived; right across the street, actually. So, to get there, we just walked back east along Ronda de Atocha and back to the Atocha Train Station. We had to again walk around the north end of the train station and then along its east side.

Puerta de Atocha: North End

Madrid Atocha is the city's largest railway station in Madrid, and the primary station serving commuter trains, intercity and regional trains from the south, and the AVE high speed trains from Barcelona, Zaragoza, Seville, Málaga, Valencia, and Alicante. (We were not on such a high speed train on either of the legs of our trip.) These train services are run by the Spanish national rail company, Renfe.

At this site, Madrid's first railway station was inaugurated in 1851 under the name Estación de Mediodía ("south", in Old Spanish). In the late 1880s, the building was largely destroyed by fire; it was rebuilt and reopened in 1892. The architect for the replacement chose a wrought iron renewal style; the building's design was also partially done by Gustave Eiffel. The name "Atocha" has become attached to the station because of the nearby basilica dedicated to Our Lady of Atocha. The train platforms were partly covered by a roof in the form of inverted hull with a height of approximately 90 feet and length of some 475 feet. The steel and glass roof spreads between two brick flanking buildings.

Puerta de Atocha: East Side

This complex of railway tracks expanded through the years. In 1985, a project of complete remodeling began, based on designs by Rafael Moneo. In 1992, the original building was taken out of service as a terminal, and converted into a concourse with shops, cafés, and a nightclub. Like the Orsay Museum in Paris, the concourse has been given a new attraction as well, here a 40,000 square foot covered tropical garden. That garden and those shops and clubs are what are now under the arched roof behind Fred in the picture above, and in the building at right in the picture at right.

A modern terminal was also designed by Moneo, and built in adjacent land to serve both the new AVE trains and local commuter lines. The main lines end in the new terminal; commuter train platforms are located underground, at the ingress to a rail tunnel extending northward under the Paseo de la Castellana. The station is served by two Madrid Metro stations, Atocha and Atocha Renfe. The latter was added when the new terminal building was constructed and is directly linked to the railway station.

If you look behind Fred in the picture at right, beyond the tower that was added in the 1992 reconstruction, you can see the low, broad roof of what is now the new platform area. The north end of the building used to be the main entrance, and that end of the building had a really monumental facade.

Facade of the Palacio de Fomento

Across the street from the Atocha station is the Palace of Fomento, also known as the Ministry of Agriculture Building. It is a nineteenth-century office building designed by Ricardo Velázquez Bosco. The building was originally occupied by the Ministerio de Fomento (Ministry of Public Works and Transport), hence its name. But for most of its life the building has been the seat of the Agriculture Ministry, and the words "Ministerio de Agricultura" are prominently displayed in a cartouche on the facade.

The Palace of Fomento (seen from Atocha Station)

In 1905, a group of marble sculptures by Agustí Querol Subirats entitled La Gloria y los Pegasos was placed on top of the building. The original sculptures have been removed to a National Museum, and replaced by bronze replicas. There are also handsome sculptures on either side of the main entrance to the building- which was placed on Spain's national heritage register in 1989.

On the map at left, you can get an idea of the area of Madrid that we were covering this evening- from our condo, past the station, to Greg's hotel, to dinner, and back. To give you some idea of the distances involved, the straight-line distance from our condo to Greg's hotel was about a half mile, so you can see that the map section is about a mile wide and a half mile high.

We collected Greg, John, and John and then began walking northwest past the station and then diagonally up the street towards Plaza Mayor. Greg was kind of leading us as he had stopped in the hotel lobby to ask for some recommendations of places we might go, and the advice he was given was to head up this way towards an area with lots of restaurants and bars- and residences:

(Click on Thumbnails to View)

The area around Atocha Station is very busy; it is at the foot of Parque Retiro, one of Spain's largest, at a transportation nexus, near the Prado Museum, three performance venues, and a great many hotels. For one thing, there were statues all over the place- from the monumental to a few that were more whimsical.

Looking Back Along Calle Atocha

It may be a little confusing, but the street we are following is Calle Atocha (our condo was just off Ronda de Atocha, and the station has that name as well)- a fairly main street with lots of people about. After about a half mile of walking up the street, we stopped to check our map and decided that we needed to angle off the main street into a more neighborhood-like area, looking for Plaza Santa Ana.

All the way up Calle Atocha, Fred and I had been again taking casual pictures- of some of the interesting shops and things we passed, and looking down some of the side streets. Here is a selection of some of the pictures we took before we reached Plaza Santa Ana:

(Click on Thumbnails to View)

We made our way through some of the side streets east of Calle Atocha, trying to follow the map, and eventually we came to the northwest corner of Plaza Santa Ana. As the folks at the hotel had told Greg, this was a large open plaza lined on all sides by restaurants, many of which had set up outdoor tables out in the square itself.

At left is an aerial view of this beautiful city square. While there were lots of restaurants and shops all around, there were also many residences on the upper floors of the buildings, and it seemed as if all those residents were in or around the square this evening, as it seemed that just about every restaurant was doing a land-office business.

Plaza de Santa Ana (Saint Anne Square) is a plaza located near the Puerta del Sol and Calle de Huertas, in the Barrio de las Letras. It features monuments to Spanish Golden Age writer Pedro Calderón de la Barca and the Granadian poet Federico García Lorca and numerous restaurants, cafes and tapas bars, with its terraces covering most of the sides surfaces.

Teatro Español, the oldest theater in Madrid, is located on the plaza's east side. It was built in seventeenth century and then had the name Corral del Príncipe. On the west side of the plaza, a luxury hotel was built in the early 1800s; it was a favorite of the most popular bullfighters. The plaza is a popular meeting point here in Madrid, and was certainly busy this evening.

The square's name derives from a monastery with the name Santa Ana that stood here in the 1600s, although today's urban plaza has its origins with Joseph I, who in 1810, with urban sanitation of Madrid in mind, demolished the old Carmelite monastery and the adjoining houses. The plaza's current appearance dates to about 1880.

We were lucky to find a restaurant that not only had a decent menu (with something for everybody) but also some available outside seating. Everybody found something they liked, and the service was quite good. Of course we took pictures, and here are a few of them:

Our Group at Dinner

John Toohey and Myself

Greg Ordering Dinner (in Spanish)

We had a really nice dinner, but right at the end it started to rain, so we paid the check quickly and went inside the restaurant itself to wait out the shower. This took about fifteen minutes, during which time John and John decided that they would stay for a drink and then get a taxi back to the hotel. When the rain stopped, Greg, Fred, and I headed on back down to Atocha Station. Along the way, we made plans with Greg to walk around Madrid tomorrow, as John and John would be visiting friends that live here in Madrid.

Back down by the station, Greg headed back to his hotel while Fred and I walked down Ronda de Atocha to our own condo. Today was pretty much a travel day, but we hope to see a good many of the "sights" of Madrid tomorrow.

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	May 8, 2018: Exploring Madrid with Greg
	Return to the Index for Our Visit to Madrid