Why don’t people think of Madrid for a city break? Barcelona hogs the headlines while Seville and Granada lure the history buffs – meanwhile, places like Bilbao and Valencia are on the rise for weekenders. In a way, it’s a first city that’s been shunted down to second city by tourists, voting with their feet.
Yet Spain’s capital has all of the late-night fun, bargain tapas and creative buzz of its siblings – plus a lot more art history and swirling royal architecture to see as you wander. There’s a faded grandeur to its old kingly stomping grounds and a graffiti-slicked grunginess to its rejuvenated hipster districts, but the clash of old and new is all part of the fun.
It is, however, big. So pick the neighbourhoods you want to dip into – there are easily five to seven worth your time – and plan mornings and afternoons around seeing their highlights. Blissfully, there are only a couple of truly “must-see” sights that you’ll pay to enter – most are palaces, monuments and parks you can stroll by or through – and you can skip the underwhelming city centre (around “Sol”) altogether, bar the fun Mercado San Miguel. Best of all, there’s a huge range of accommodation and dinner options to choose from, whether your jam is celeb-fave five-stars, edgy hostels, bargain caffs or swanky power lunch spots. If you simply love being in Spain, this is a decadent place to while away a few days in style.
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What to do
Promenade in Retiro Park
Madrid’s sprawling, elegantly faded green space, Parque de El Retiro, hugs the main avenue that leads to the city’s two biggest art museums as well as the main city station, Atocha. Grab a morning coffee and stroll around it before heading to one of them; you’ll spy huge former palaces with glass domes and pretty painted tiles; a huge, serene boating pond; trickling fountains; statues; and a glinting “Crystal Palace” modelled on London’s in the late 19th century. The latter is now used as an exhibition space by the Reina Sofia Museum – pass the fizzing fountain in front and stop in to see site-specific projects and one-off exhibitions.
Spanish art history 101
Madrid has two main galleries: the Museo del Prado and the Reina Sofia. The former is a classic stroll through Spanish art history, all mood-lighting and hushed hallways, while the latter is a maze of bright-white, contemporary studios featuring edgy photography, vivid protest art and, most famously, Picasso’s Guernica….
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