A sleepy day...

Another hot, hot day here in Madrid. We stayed up a little too late last night and drank a little too much cava and the adults are feeling it – let’s just say we’re moving a bit slowly today. I think Jeff and I were so excited to have someone else to talk to that when Jennie arrived we celebrated a bit too much with cheap bottles of bubbly cava!

(The picture on the left is from yesterday, it's the Plaza de Mayor where we ate some paella like proper tourists!)

This morning we took awhile to get up, dressed, and ready to go. Julia really wanted to stay home all day and play in the pool so we had a bit of a compromise and decided to head out for lunch and a look at the Plaza de Toros, then back home for some relaxation. The Plaza de Toros is big, and grand, and it looks like they still have bullfights there every Sunday evening. We had lunch at a kebab place (I know, not traditional Spanish food but we were hungry and it smelled delicious!), then came back for a very refreshing swim. I’m so glad we have the pool, it definitely makes the stay here much more pleasant and the heat a lot easier to deal with. Julia made some big improvements in her swimming today and she finally got up the courage to take off her water wings and swim! We are all very excited for her and she’s feeling very happy and proud of herself – as she should. We made the kids come in from the pool for awhile because the sun is so hot and we didn’t want to get a sunburn or heatstroke. They weren’t overly pleased by that parenting decision but we stuck to our guns and had a bit of a rest. Then back to the pool! I think they are a little tired of touring around cities so we’re trying to balance a bit of kid stuff with the adult stuff so that everyone stays happy.

After a very relaxing afternoon Jennie, Chloe and I took an excursion to the supermercado to check out all the different groceries. It's always so interesting to see the different snack foods and frozen items and we bought a few things to take home, and Chloe found some old fashioned hair rollers that she is planning to use as pool noodles for her Barbies. (Oh, did you know that pool noodles here are called pool churros? Funny.)

We went for a delicious dinner tonight in a very non-touristy place. Jeff went to school with a guy who lives in Madrid and gave us a recommendation for a neighbourhood and specific restaurant that specializes in Galician food. He told us to ask for the menu del dia because they never give it to tourists without being asked for it. What a tip! The menu was 12 euros and included a starter, a main dish, wine or beer, bread and coffee or dessert. Cheap!! Without the menu each item alone was about 8 euros so it was definitely a good deal and the food was really good. Then we hit the gelato stand for excellent, fresh gelato and rode the metro home where we are currently getting ready to hit the sack. One full day left on this vacation... in some ways it's gone by so quickly and in others it feels like we've been here for ages. One thing I'm looking forward to is my own bed... but I don't know if I'm totally ready for real life to begin again!

Tomorrow we will pack in all of our last Spanish things... churros in chocolate and flamenco dancing! And most likely the pool... then packing for home!