Sweltered in Madrid

Well the blog has been neglected primarily because I’ve been bushwhacked & also because I’ve been busy being the tourist & today, hanging out with Jeff… more on that later.

I left off my last post when I was en route to Barcelona from Paris - the train ended up having a 2-hr delay so we didn’t get into Barcelona until about 11.50pm. There was one point where we were at a standstill for a good 45 mins in Sète on the south coast of France (the little I saw of it looked beautiful). I went to the train’s cafe bar to find there was no food left except for Kit Kats so was resigning myself to having a cereal bar I had packed. Another English-speaking traveller was similarly hungry & we decided to ‘risk it for a biscuit’ to get off the train & see if there was any food in the station… there was only a vending machine, so we jogged into the town hoping the train wouldn’t take off without us. A nearby restaurant was closing but the owner mentioned a Spar up the road - we couldn’t find it then got nervous about getting even further from the train (with our bags still on) and legged it back to try the station’s vending machine whose codes didn’t match up with the products on display. Thankfully once we got moving again (which was probably only 10 minutes after the futile mad dash) SNCF picked up some supplies at a later station & everyone got a complementary box of snacks. Tinned mixed salad never tasted so good!

Video below from the Paris-Barcelona train, somewhere in France.

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/2ee65f_085a31a1021243fe95f59685936b2884/480p/mp4/file.mp4

My overnight in Barcelona was brief as my next train on Thursday morning to Madrid was at 10.40am & all bags have to go through a security screening.

Everywhere I’d been up to this point since Holyhead had been lovely & warm - shorts weather all the way, & the warmth & sunshine gradually increased as I travelled south. Arriving at lunchtime I found that Madrid took the heat to a whole new level. My phone was telling me it was 36C - it would have sweltered ye (transl. = it was fierce heat). In the evening the wind picked up & I felt like I was being followed around by a giant hairdryer. At the hostel I met a young woman from Seville where she said it was 44C & she was delighted to be in Madrid for it to be a bit cooler. And I heard from an Argentinian I spoke to later that someone had collapsed at the door of the hostel in the heat the day before. I love a bit of heat & sunshine, usually I’ll take every opportunity to soak up some Vit. D, but as I wandered Madrid’s streets I made a point of walking in the shade as much as possible.

So that’s essentially what I did in Madrid - aimless wandering, especially as the tourist map I had wasn’t terribly clear & my mobile data wasn’t working so I had no GPS & kept walking round inadvertently in circles. In between I enjoyed some tapas & then later back at the hostel I joined other travellers for the evening’s hostel dinner which was really tasty - 3 courses, beer/sangria & all for €12, great value!

Pic below: Came across this gorgeous living wall near the Museo del Prado, almost looks like a sculpture.