On to Madrid! (Feb 8)

It was a rainy morning so we took a taxi to the train station. We took a high speed train to Madrid, and found our way to "Hostal Isabel", which was at a woman's house. Can you guess her name?? That's right. It was Beatrice! We never figured that one out! Another mystery... we had a bidet in our room, but not a toilet. Oh well...

We were pooped and it was still rainy, so we settled in and took a one hour nap, then headed out to the Thyssen-Bornemiza museum. We used the metro, but we were still soaked by the time we arrived. This museum is filled with major works by minor artists and minor works by major artists. Overall worth a visit, but too much art to cover and too much impressionism for Jen! There were works by Titan, Tintoretto, El Greco, Caravaggio, and Van Gogh.

We ate a lunch of tapas, which was expensive but a great sampling of Spanish classics! Then on to the Prado! The Prado Museum is HUGE! The greatest art museum in Spain. We were overwhelmed, and starting to get museumed out! Enough "Madonna with Child" already! When there is so much great art in one place it's hard to appreciate it all. We did get to see Tintoretto's "Last Supper" which was on loan from the Uffizi in Venice. Funny...weren't we just there?? We also go to see "Las Meninas" by Velazquez.