Seeing as the group was heading to another museum today, I decided that it was time to do my own thing. Had errands to run and just was not in the mood for another museum.
So, I made it my day, and it was glorious in every way, shape, and form.
Didn’t finally get out of bed until 11, got ready and headed to Starbucks. Grande Vanilla Bean Frappucino and chocolate doughnut. Yum. Sat in a really comfy armchair and tried to figure out what I was going to do with my day. I wanted to go to the aquarium, but the bus didn’t run by there, and I didn’t have a Metro map, nor did I want to take the Metro at all. So I flagged some pages in my guide of things I was interested in, then headed to Corte Ingles to buy a second bag to check so my first suitcase wouldn’t be overweight. Got quite the deal! The small suitcases were 45 euro, so I decided on a Reebok athletic-type bag, which was 25. But it rang up 17.50…score! A definite good omen for the rest of the day.
Went souvenir shopping after that and got a whole bunch of crap. Stuff for Mom, Dad, Wen, Claire, and Matthew. I loved going into the little shops and looking at all the shit they had. And then finding cute stuff made it even better! Like Madrid coasters for my new apartment J
Went back to the hotel to drop all that stuff off, then hopped on the double-decker Madrid Vision bus to go to the Hard Rock Café. I couldn’t decide if I wanted to eat there, so I just went in the gift shop, which was disappointingly small. Headed back out to find the National Library and may have made a wrong turn :\ Oops! Figured it out eventually and went back in the right direction. Saw on the map that the Wax Museum was really close by, so I hunted it down, but it had JUST closed and didn’t open until 4. And it was 2:30-ish. I spoke Spanish to some teenagers and they explained the whole situation to me.
So I decided on that meal at Hard Rock. I spoke to the hostess in Spanish, and she handed me the buzzer and explained it to me, then asked for my name. I said, “Amy” but then spelled it out in English letters as opposed to Spanish letters and just had to laugh. Oops. Then when I was buzzed, she asked me if I wanted a menu in Spanish or English. I told her I didn’t care, so she said (in Spanish, of course) “Spanish. It’s much better!” So cute.
My waiter’s name was Enrique, a scruffy, gangly thing, but he was so nice. And we only spoke Spanish. I loved it!
Got to see some guitars from Mountain, Cream, Kiss, Blind Melon, Phil Collins’ drum head, and one of Elton John’s shirts, among other things. Love! Ordered a grilled chicken sandwich with fries, and it was ginormous!
Headed to the Wax Museum after that, and it was absolutely ridiculous. So sketch and creepy. It was crazy, though, because people just started flocking to it right around the time it was opening. And lots of little kids! It just made me smile. I guess I must still be a kid, too.
At the beginning, there was a whole hall of monarchs, along with some Arab royalty. They absolutely looked real. My favorite part was the second half, though. You walk in and the very first things you see are the Spanish Prince and Princess, along with the King and Queen and rest of the royal family. Then there was a lifelike set-up of Goya’s Third of May. It was sick. And of course, those goddamn Las Meninas.
There were a lot of artists and writers in that hall. Then came Bill Gates and a lot of athletes – Michael Jordan, Rafael Nadal, etc. But my favorites were to come. There was an old Western scene with Bruce Willis as the bar tender, then a whole bunch of political figures – Arafat, Hitler, Churchill, Ghandi, Princess Diana, Mother Theresa, and Obama and JFK. My stupid camera died when I was trying to take a picture of Obama. There was Batman and Jack Nicolson as the Joker. Scary as crap, let me tell you. Mary Poppins was hanging from the ceiling spinning in circles. Then there was a room with Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and an absolutely realistic Johnny Depp from Pirates of the Caribbean. I wanted a picture with him so badly! People would have thought I really met him!
Upstairs was the museum of crime, and I almost soiled myself. There was no one around, which made it that much scarier, and it was set up like a cave, with different horrific scenes in each one. People getting hung, tortured, impaled, committing suicide, and the like. I couldn’t walk all the way through it cause I was too scared. No likey.
My favorite part was the more “current” celebrities like The Beatles, Michael Jackson, Louis Armstrong, etc, etc, AND David Bisbal. I was giddy!
Headed to the National Library after that and saw Moorish books written in Arabic and Spanish circa year 900. Pretty redic.
Then went to the Temple of Debod after that. It’s an ancient Egyptian temple that was rebuilt in Madrid as a gift to the Spaniards for helping the Egyptians preserve some historic monuments from being destroyed. There’s a gorgeous park that surrounds it and a fountain behind it. I laid down on the grass in the shade and felt grass for the first time in 35 days. Granted, there was some grass in Oviedo, but I never sat down and enjoyed it. I was getting really thirsty, so I hunted down an ice cream stand and got a 1.5 liter bottle of water for 2 euro. Easily the best purchase of the whole trip J
The group ended up running into me on the way to the cable car lift, so I decided to join them. I was all kinds of scared, but I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to make myself more scared than I already was. It ended up being ridiculously awesome. It was a 15-minute ride each way, and we were lifted over highways, apartment buildings, and one of the main parks in Madrid.
Since I had a late lunch and wasn’t feeling too hungry, I decided to head back to the hotel. I really needed a shower and was going to go to a bar where Walt Whitman used to drink, but they never found it, so I just hung out at the hotel. Got everything packed up, finally, Skyped with Sean and Mom and headed to bed.
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