Things to do in Madrid

Madrid sits at 650 metres, and the altitude shows in the weather. It has no sea and no real river. What it has is the court, the paintings and the late hours.

The centre on foot

The old core is flat, and you cross it in half an hour.

• Puerta del Sol. The Kilometre Zero slab, where Spain's six highways start.
• Plaza Mayor. Closed off in 1619, used in turn for markets, bullfights and executions.
• The Royal Palace. Some 3,400 rooms, the largest in western Europe. The king lives elsewhere.
• La Latina and Lavapiés. Tavern country, and the Rastro's ground on Sundays.
• The Retiro. The old royal garden, with a rowing lake and a pavilion of glass.

Doing the Prado properly

Three museums stand within a fifteen-minute walk on the Paseo del Prado. The Prado owns some eight thousand paintings. It hangs a fraction, in no obvious order.

• The free hours. Entry is free for the last two. Queue from half past four, not six, and you should be inside by quarter past five, with an hour and a half that is genuinely yours.
• Shade in summer. There is none on that pavement. Bring a cap, or an umbrella to stand under: the heat is the real obstacle.
• Pick two painters before you go. Velázquez and Goya, unless you have a reason otherwise. Look up their rooms, go straight to one, then the other. Wander only after that.
• The last quarter of an hour. Staff start clearing the galleries fifteen minutes before closing.

Wander first and you will miss something you came for. The building is too big for one pass. If the paintings are the point, come twice.

The Reina Sofía keeps Guernica and closes on Tuesdays.

Eating, and the small hours

Lunch starts at two, dinner at nine or ten. A bar offering you dinner at seven is a tourist trap. Walk on.

• Breakfast is the cheap meal. Tortilla and coffee, or a hot ham roll with churros, comes to five euros and often less, from eight in the morning. Madrid is not the city to pay fifteen for poached eggs.
• Nights. The city runs to six every night but Monday, and there is usually an afters after that. Dress codes barely exist and nobody is posing. Two in the morning on a Tuesday is unremarkable.

Where the day trips go

• Toledo. A walled hill town of cathedrals, synagogues and mosques, half an hour south by fast train.
• Segovia. A Roman aqueduct of 167 arches, no mortar. Balloons go up at dawn.
• El Escorial. Philip II's monastery-palace, usually paired with Cuelgamuros.
• Further by rail. Seville, Córdoba and even Barcelona are done and back in a day.

Practical

• Climate. The local saying gives Madrid nine months of winter and three of hell. Afternoons pass 35C in July.
• From the airport. A flat 33 euros by taxi inside the M-30 ring. The metro costs a fraction.
• Beer. A caña is the small glass, around 200 ml, well under two euros. A doble is twice that, and about two euros.
• Free hours. Nearly every museum here has one. Madrid likes a discount, and building a day around them is normal.
• Book ahead. Royal Palace slots, flamenco tables and weekend Toledo trains go first.