First Visit to Madrid

Today was packed! I took the 30min bus into Madrid and then the metro to where the Vuelta Espana finishes tomorrow. I walked most of the route they'll be riding in Madrid and spent several hours in Parque Retiro. The streets had the blue guard rails ready to be put up, and they had started to set up some seating and stuff at the finish. The finish is similar to the finish of the Tour de France where they ride up & down one strip for awhile & cross the finish line a few times before the end, so hopefully I'll get to see a lot of cycling tomorrow!!

Parque Retiro is amazing! It's really pretty and there were tons of people there but it didn't feel crowed at all b/c it's massive. I walked around and saw a lot of the statues, fountains, the big lake in the center where you can rent rowboats (which I did when I studied here 3 years ago & hope to do again at some point this year), gymnasiums, soccer fields, tennis courts, and lots of people running, biking, roller blading and roller skating all over. Ideally I would live within a short walk to Parque Retiro, however housing around the park is uber expensive. It would be so nice to be able to run here (and have motivation because there are lots of people of all levels running) and to just come and people watch, etc. It's so peaceful! The park also had one of the "retired people" exercise areas, so I sat on the bike and pedaled for a good 30minutes which was neat. There were people statues, like where people dress up & paint themselves as statues. There was a guy dressed & painted like a native american/indian which looked really well done & he would give out his hunting call (he had a bow & arrow) when someone gave him a tip. There was also a fair type thing going on in the middle with games. One of the games was live fooseball. There was a blowup arena/game area & then poles width wise. Kids were placed on the poles like in fooseball and could only move sideways. Just goes to show how popular soccer really is! While walking around I was spotted and approached by 2 other girls from the US. At first it was cool, then they told me they were missionaries from the Jesus Christ Church of Latter Day Saints (Mormons) and spent several minutes trying to convert me. I was nice enough, but I guess they got the picture. They did give me their card with a picture of their temple in Madrid as well as the address of the temple and their phone numbers. The temple looks really pretty, so maybe I'll go by it to snap a picture sometime.

After spending several hours in Madrid I came back to watch today's stage of the Vuelta Espana. It was a tough mountain finish and exciting to watch! I can't wait to see these guys live tomorrow!! After the Vuelta, it was time to watch some football! I watched Georgia Tech beat UNC in a really close offensive game. I did have to keep myself from clapping, screaming, yelling, etc since the walls in my apartment are pretty thin and with windows open you can hear almost everything in the courtyard area. Didn't really want to draw attention to myself while watching an American football game. After the game I dinner and now I'm going to get ready to go see the Vuelta tomorrow!