Madrid in five days

The capital city of Spain is a place where the most diverse cultures converge, making Madrid one of the richest and varied in terms of offers to its habitants and visitors.

If you’ve decided to travel and spend a short vacation in the city, here are some tourist recommendations and attractive places that are essential for you to visit.

First Day

La Puerta del Sol is definitely the first place you should go to start your tour in the city. It’s one of the most known squares of the capital, and you can find a few of the historical and most trafficked streets of the city.

In this place you will find emblematic elements of Madrid such as the House of the Post Office with the famous clock on top of the building, and the plate of the Kilometer Zero, indicating the origin of the mileage of the different national radial roads that depart of Madrid.

Then you could visit the Plaza Mayor which is a few meters from the Puerta del Sol, is one of the oldest and most important in the city, it stands out for its history and is also known for the markets working there during the weekends. Historic buildings like The Bakery House or the equestrian statue of Felipe III, and then you can go for the gastronomic offers in the restaurants of Cutlers Street.

Keep going with your route to the Royal Palace, which was the majestic residence of many Spanish monarchs, and where you can meet the throne room or the Royal Armory. Today is a must for history lovers.

Second Day

 

Start the day by going to the Paseo del Prado, an urban garden with a long history. It’s one of the places of greater cultural concentration in Spain, and in a little more than a kilometer is the Prado Museum, the National Museum of Art Reina Sofía and the Museum Thyssen Barnemisza.

Also known as the art walk, in addition to the museums you will find exhibition halls, galleries and monuments. And you can enjoy a pleasant tour around the area and observe with attention a monumental set that shines with its own light, Neptuno and Cibeles fountains.

And if you’re traveling with kids we recommend you to visit the Buen Retiro Park, the most important green area of Madrid where you’ll find boat rides, puppet shows and actors disguised as children characters and musicians.

But even if you go alone it still is an excellent place for a quiet hike while enjoying the ponds, rivers, fountains, monumental gates and buildings such as the Royal Astronomical Observatory, the Hermitage of San Pelayo, the Crystal Palace or the Palace of Velasquez.

The next stop is the Alcalá Gate in the Independence Square, which is one of the most representative and iconic monuments of Madrid, and when afternoon arrives you can tour the Gran Vía, a famous street not only for its architectural group but for its wide selection of restaurants, shops, cinemas, theaters and hotels.

Third Day

Come on, we already know that football is a passion by many Spanish people, players and fans feel the same, so another site that you must visit is the famous Santiago Bernabeu Stadium, one of the most visited places in the city, belonging to of course, the Real Madrid FC.

They offer tours to tourists and visitors through the emblematic places of the club and allows seeing the stadium as the authorities do, from the presidential box. The tour includes the players’ costumes where few are reluctant to take a picture next to the space of their favorite player

Then you can head to the Barrio de Salamanca and visit the Golden Mile, one of the most luxurious area in which you will find designer shops with restaurants mainly dedicated to gourmet food.

Fourth Day

 For this day you need to go to the Casa de Campo, a public park that has a zoo and an aquarium, amusement park, lake, walk of Extremadura, among others. It’s ideal if you want to start the day between nature.

In the afternoon you can take the Cable Car of Madrid to the Paseo del Pintor Rosales where you will enjoy a journey of more than two kilometers with a beautiful view of the city.

And if you like to watch the sunset, visit the Temple of Debod, an authentic Egyptian temple donated by Egypt to Spain in 1968. It’s one of the great treasures that Madrid hides, and is surrounded by gardens of great beauty.

From here you aren’t very far to the center of Madrid to which you can return for dinner and taste the classic Tapas and end the day with a walk between the square.

Fifth Day

The center of Madrid offers so many options for tourists that it gets difficult to visit them well in a day, so for this last day of the trip you could pass through one of those areas that you haven’t visited yet.

If you haven’t known yet the neighborhood of the Morerías, it’s a great option to take a walk through its square and then walk through its streets in which you will have options to choose at lunchtime, with special mention to Corral de la Morería which is a popular restaurant where you can also enjoy a flamenco show.

It’s a historical area in which there are several historical monuments such as the Church of San Pedro or the Church of San Andrés.

And if it happens to be a Sunday or a holiday, you can visit El Rastro, which is an outdoor market located in the popular neighborhood of La Latina, where you will find books, clothes and curiosities of all kinds.