The first thing on our agenda today was to go see the Royal Palace. It is the official residence for the Royal family, but these days they only use it for state ceremonies. The rest of the time it is open to the public. The Palacio Real was built during the 18th and 19th centuries, and is a monumental building. It is the largest royal palace in Western Europe. It was built on the site of the old Alcazar, the Moorish castel destroyed by fire in 1734.
The palace was initially designed by Filippo Javarre to accommodate the court of Felipe V, a total of more than 3000 coutiers. Jean Bautista Sacchetti initaited the building project in 1737 and Francisco Sabatini and Venturo Rodriquez completed the works. It is surrounded by Sabatini and Campo del Moro parks.
The palace itself contains furniture, tapestries, paintings and ceramics as well as other important works of art and frescos by Tiepolo, Velazquez, Goya and many other Spanish artists.
The courtyard of the Palace which faces the Cathedral.
The grand staircase. Photo's are allowed here but once you enter the various rooms no phot's are allowed.
I remember going through this palace many years ago and was so impressed with its beauty. Still am. It's very, very impressive.
A picture taken with my new selfie stick. I had dropped my old one and although I had mended it with glue I was hesitant to use it. I was fearful that it might break and my phone would fall and be damaged. What would I do then for pictures on my blog. The selfie stick may be new but it takes the same old kind of pictures. I did see an app on line for photoshopping selfies. Perhaps I should get it.
Notice my fashion statement once again - white socks to match my shite shirt!
Our next visit to Parque de la Ritiro - " The Park of the Pleasant Retreat". Retiro Park was created as a royal park; it belonged to the Real Sitio del Buen Retiro palace. In 1632, the palace was built by King Philip IV as a retreat for the Royal family. Retiro stands for retreat, hence the name of the park and palace.
At the time the parkk was well outside the city walls, but now Madrid has completely enclosed the Retiro park. The 320 acre large royal park opened to the public in 1868. It is partially lid out in a formal French style, while other parts are more natural.
Here we are straining to see if we have the camera on the selfie stick positioned correctly.
Here we're just laughing at ourselves. I do think the photo shop app is a must or else a longer stick - ha!
Close to the northern entrance of the park is a large artificial lake. Here you can rent row boats. A large monument with an equestrian statue of King Alfonso XII overlooks the lake. The monument, erected in 1922 by King Alfonso's mother consist of a semicircular colonnade with an equestrian statue of the King in front. ( I'm wondering why my mother didn't build something like that for me. We lived right across the street from the river and it would have looked lovely on the far bank. Since I don't ride horses perhaps I could have been standing on my head or in a backbend or doing the splits. Well come to think of it I don't think those poses would have been too impressive on top of the colonnade. That's probably why she didn't do it.)
We stopped for lunch and had a lovely view of the lake and the people out in the rowboats.
This building is used for temporary exhibits. It was designed in 1884 by the same architect who designed the Christal Palace. It originally served as a pavilion for the national exhibition of the mining, metal, glass and ceramis industry. There was a very interesting exhibit in this building - sorry I didn't get any pictures. 
Behind this small lake is a glass building, the Palacio de Cristal. Built in 1887 by Ricardo Vellllallzquez Bosco after the Crystal Palace in London. It was initially used to house exotic plants brought over from the Philippines. It is now mainly used for temporary exhibitions.
This was the exhibition when we wre there. Wouldn't have wantd to miss this. The title in English is The Marionette Maker.
There was more but I think you've seen enough :-)!
We walked a long way in this park but didn't really see half or it. There is a Rose garden with more than 4000 roses which features a statue of El Angel Caido( the fallen angel, aka Lucifer) one of the few statues to the devil anywhere in the world. In the same vein , the Puerto d Dante, in the extreme SE corner of the park, is watched over by a carved mural of Dante's Inferno.
Occupying much of the southwestern corner of the park is the Jardin de los Planteles, one of the least-visited sections of El Retiro, where quiet pathways lead beneath an overarching canopy of trees. West of here is the moving Bosque del Recuerdo ( Memorial Forest), an understated memorial to the 191 victims of the 11 March 2004 train bombings. For each victim stands an olive or cyprus tree. There is also what is thought to be Marid's oldest tree, a Mexican conifer. Planted in 1633 and with a trunk circumference of 52 m, it was used by French soldiers during the Napoleonic Ways in the early 19th century as a cannon mount. Those are just a few of the highlights of the park.
We had thought we would return to Cava Baja and try out some of th recommendations that Andreaus had made. Unfortunately, when we went out around 7:30 nothing was open yet. We had seen a nice looking restaurant that looked open so we went back and decided to just eat there. It was a lovely restaurant and had great ratings on trip advisor. We shared a grilled vegetable platter and an order of suckling pig - their speciality.
Before we had to catch our train we had some time so we just started to wander down streets we hadn't been. Never know what you can find.
We were back in the neighborhood where we had eaten on the tapas tour and wanted to go into this church but when we did we realized a mass was going on so we snuck out. It was really a pretty church inside.
I love the street signs in Madrid. These are miniatures that you can purchase. I resisted.
A few leaks at the train station. Yellow buckets add ambiance. This is however a beautiful train station with its steel and glass construction and tropicall gardens that line the concourse. We forgot to look for the gardens and the permanent display of sculptures. We had done a lot of walking in the morning and were tired when we got to the station so we ate lunch and relaxed. Too bad - opportunity missed!
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Our last look of Madrid from the train station window.
Someone just had to go see the jewels at the jewelry store. No purchases.
We returned home , went to the superarket, and out to dinner at our favorite neighborhood restaurant. Best thing is its right down the street from our apartment.
A few more books to add to the list:
The Nightingale Kristin Hannah
And Justice There is None Deborah Crombie - book number 8 of a 16 book series
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