Next we walked through some old areas and returned to the mercado and saw the oldest doorway in Spain. Then we came upon the parade which is on a separate entry. After that we continued to the royal palace.
What an amazing and beautiful place! Rick Steves calls it the third best palace in Europe after Versailles and one in Austria. I think it was great. We took the audio tour and saw 24 rooms. The walls and ceilings were decorated with great art and there were frescoes and statues and twinkly crystal chandeliers. The current king and queen still use the palace.
The dining room can seat up to 140 for a meal. I loved seeing the Stradivarius room with five instruments of only 300 that exist. There are two violins, a viola and two cellos. When musicians entertain at the palace, they use these instruments. Wow!
After our tour we had lunch at a classy cafe and then got on the hop on bus to go across town.
We arrived at the Reina Sofia museum and proceeded to room 206 to see Guernica. This is Picasso's masterpiece and so important artistically and politically. I had seen it years ago at MOMA and it is now back where it belongs in Spain. Saw a few other works and the Dali room and then left. We took another bus route and saw some other neighborhoods including the US Embassy and the Realmadrid football (soccer) stadium.
We rested and then went out for a paella dinner at a nearby restaurant. We are being picked up at 7:00 am for our flight home.
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