Lisbon to Madrid

We spent our third day in Lisbon walking around, drinking coffee, and eating cheap pastries. We checked out of our hostel and went to purchase our "autocarros" tickets. We bought the last two and were lucky to get them. We arrived at the bus station at 7:30pm for our 9:00pm reservation - looked good and comfortable. Only one small problem - No Bano!!! If you have ever been on a drive with Kelly for more than 2 hours, you would understand our problem of no bathrooms. The bus was not bad - leather seats! - Kelly slept reasonably well (thanks to dramanine), and Steve slept about 2 of the 8 hours on the bus. The best part was that when you got on the bus you got a pair of free headphones to listen to the bus radio - the only problem with that was that there were only three stations, one of which played the Michael Jackson song "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" on repeat the whole trip.

We arrived in Madrid at 6:30am and hopped on the metro. We exited the underground surprised to see a bustling city at 7:00am on a Sunday morning. So many people, just out sipping coffee, etc. We walked about 3 blocks to our hostel, but check in was at 12:00pm, so we left our bags and explored the city.

Outside, most of the people were gone. Apparently, everyone was up from the night before. Kelly had our morning planned out, so we headed to an outdoor market that opened at 8:00am. It was nice for the two of us to wander around Madrid like we had the city to ourselves. During our hour walk (we got lost a few times), we passed only a handful of people - all of whom were very happy and eager to give the two American tourist directions. Steve can barely be nice to himself that early!!

When we arrived at the market, we were shocked by the amount of people. Only a minute ago, we thought we had an entire city to ourselves, then suddenly hundreds of people were trying to buy other people's used products. It was a huge flea market that was several blocks long, on a very steep hill. We decided to try to get Steve some culture, so we headed of to the Museo National del Prada (it is free on Sunday.) We saw paintings by some very famous artists that Steve already cannot remember.

By this time, we were able to check in to our hostel, and get the well deserved shower. Now we are taking a break so that we can stay up late and eat tapas!!

We'll post back soon.