Madrid day 2

Yesterday was a fairly more relaxing day. I started the morning with the local chocolate palmier for breakfast - it was huge and even with Gerard's help I couldn't finish it but it was tasty. We then went for a wander and passed a train station Gerard had read about where there are palm trees in the centre surrounded by a pond full of tortoises, so naturally we went in to see - there were hundreds of them and it was pretty cool. See how many you can count in the picture.

We then headed to the main park in Madrid to make the most of the (sadly patchy) sunlight. The park was gorgeous and full of different themed areas and statues and fountains. While meandering we came across over 300 book stalls in a festival with local authors doing signings. Gerard was most impressed with the beer stall where you could get a free straw hat if you bought a half pint and so he did and we both looked slightly ridiculous in these hats for the next hour or so.

After the park we walked up to the bull fighting ring where it looked like a fight may have been taking place later on. Then it was back to the hostel to attempt to save some cash by cooking for ourselves - this was one funny experience! There were 7 people each trying to make something by fighting over 2 pots, 3 frying pans and 4 working hobs - a recipe for disaster. in the end me and Gerard politely stood at the side until we could grab a pot for our pasta. There was an Australian family with a grown up daughter who was trying to cook and her mum kept butting in and annoying her and commenting on how what we were doing to cook pasta was wrong. The father sat at the table in silence glaring at them and demanding that they cook him a fry up instead of the meal they were having themselves. There was also a spanish man who hogged the sink for 5 minutes just to wash three pieces of cutlery. All in all we had to just laugh.