On Our Feet

Another day on our feet. In fact, we ran through Retiro Park this morning…4 miles or so…Retiro Park is the equivalent of Madrid’s Central Park, next to the Prado.

After our run, we applied ourselves to aggressive sight-seeing, stopping by the Palacio Real, the Cathedral near the palace and a church where Goya is buried, called Ermita de San Antonio de la Florida. Goya also painted the fresco on the ceiling…an enactment of San Antonio’s ministry of healing and preaching. We ate at Mingo’s near the Goya sight.

Mingo’s is famous for its roasted chicken and hard cider. We ate a chicken between us and shared a salad and a bottle of cider. The place was full of locals and we felt very savvy to have found the place. Oh yes, and the food, especially the chicken, was delicious. Mingo’s was written up in the Lonely Planet guide…right down to what you should order when you walk in the restaurant. We have abandoned the Rick Steve’s guide when it comes to food and taken up the Lonely Planet for all things culinary. This has helped us.

Case and point, I ate ice cream at another place from the guide…Giangrossi’s, with great coffees and homemade ice-cream (Sharon passed on the ice cream, but enjoyed her coffee). I ate three scoops of ice cream...flavors...Baileys, Vanilla and Cappuccino. Yummy! We haven't been majoring on sweets, so this was a great treat for me.

In the end, it felt like we ran and then walked all over town today, so despite our best intentions of doing a “tapas tour” tonight, we collapsed in the apartment, ate cucumbers, tomatoes, cheese, Wasa wheat crackers and shared stories from our past. This trip has been great for our friendship and tonight was one of those nights that brought us deeper. Not that we haven’t had our hard moments and conflict, but overall, what a blessing to be with Sharon, who is now saying evening prayers while I type out this entry.

The photo…one of the best parts of the day, was our breakfast. Sharon cooked up our 5 chorizo sausages in eggs. We bought the chorizo at our local butcher’s. They were so great, we bought 5 more tonight, so we can make those same eggs and eat them the morning after tomorrow. That marks the end of our trip. We’ll fix a large breakfast before our flight out of Madrid at noon on Sunday. We arrive home Sunday night. One more full day…not sure what we’ll do, but looking forward to the adventure.

Oh...worth mentioning to Alex...Sharon got her boots shined today. They look fabulous and to the rest of you all, the first droplets of rain fell on us this morning...a very negligible amount, but enough to remind us of the great weather we've had while traveling. We are so thankful.