Madrid: Last day in Spain

All of yesterday was spent on two Alsa buses traveling from Pórtugos to Madrid. That’s a recipe for culture shock!

Seeing on meteoblue that a high temperature of 92° was forecast for Madrid today, we decided against following the Wikiloc walking tour I had made months ago through the oldest parts of the city. Instead, we asked Google which museums in Madrid were air conditioned. We chose the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, and it was actually fine to walk in both directions as long as we stayed on the shady side of the street.

We bought our museum tickets online and were inside the museum within two minutes after it opened. That was a lucky thing because it gave us ten minutes of standing in front of Picasso’s Guernica without any other people around us. Twenty minutes later, the crowd in front of the painting was so thick that people were holding their cameras over other people‘s heads in order to get a view. What we liked best was being able to walk around the room and see Picasso’s sketches that he made as he planned out the work.

The walk back to our apartment gave us a chance to reminisce about our trip. The comarca of the Alpujarra Granadina contains 25 municipalities. Between this trip and our two prior visits to the area, we have walked or cycled to or from 21 of those 25 municipalities, including all the ones in the area outlined by the roughly backwards capital L formed by the Ríos Trevélez and Guadalfeo on this trip. (On the map above, 21 of these municipalities are numbered and four are named.) Some munipalities contain more than one village, like La Taha with its seven villages, so we have visited at least 35 distinct villages. It has been an amazing experience to get to know one area so well.

A few of our comments:
Favorite village:
- Ned: Tíjola
- Elaine: Cáñar
- Marie: Bubión

Favorite food:
- Ned: salmorejo
- Elaine: Ned’s chicken stew
- Marie: panecillo integral

Biggest positive surprise:
- Ned: concert rehearsal invitation in Cáñar
- Elaine: the excellent walking weather - best ever on a Spain trip
- Marie: the kittens in Mecina

Biggest negative surprise:
- Ned: the Iberia Air app
- Elaine: the villages that no longer have a grocery store
- Marie: hearing a fiesta under my bedroom window at 3 a.m.

Favorite experience:
- Ned: speaking Spanish
- Elaine: getting help from local people re history
- Marie: finding new birds

Favorite app:
- Ned: PeakFinder
- Elaine: Wikiloc
- Marie: Merlin

Favorite house:
- Ned: Cortijo Jiménez
- Elaine: Casa Walhalla
- Marie: Casa Almazara

Favorite walk:
- Ned: Peña Angel view of snow-capped peaks
- Elaine: Cortijo Albercón Bajo
- Marie: El Valero

Biggest challenge:
- Ned: transportation to Spain
- Elaine: hiking uphill
- Marie: wearing a sun hat

Favorite piece of gear:
All: our running vests

Most meaningful overall:
Being together as a family and with friends.

We want to tell all of you who have followed along on FindPenguins how much it has meant to us. We have been grateful every day for your help and encouragement. How lucky we are to have you in our lives.

We fly to Boston tomorrow and to Seattle on Tuesday, so this is our last post.Read more