Honest opinion on Madrid
 

Hello. I'll be in Madrid in mid September and I'm not hearing a lot of possitive feedback about the city. Can you tell me about the 'good' experiences you've had and ideas on what to do?
Thanks! Vicki

Check out the fodors suggested 3 day itinerary. Ir pretty much covers the highlights. Madrid is a nice city, very compact and easy to get around on foot or by public transportation. IN 3.5 days we saw the the Prado, Reina Sofia and Thyssen museums, Retiro Park, the Palace, walked through several different nieghborhood and plazas, and took a day trip to Toledo.

I enjoyed the palace, the Prado, the Retiro, the Plaza Mayor and trying Spanish cuisine. Day trips to Valle de los Caidos or Toledo can be interesting.

Madrid is a fine city. Smaller than many capitol cities. Easy to navigate. Wonderful buildings. Nice avenues. Good restaurants. Lovely squares. What's not to like.

I really enjoyed the day trips from Madrid to Segovia and Toledo. As for Madrid itself, a nice city but definitely more modern than the other two I mentioned. No need to waste time at the El Rastro flea market--it's similar to those I've seen elsewhere in the US and Europe and just didn't impress me. I did like my visit to the Palacio Real--if you arrive at opening time, you have the place to yourself (we even encountered a fantastic guard inside who spoke perfect English and knew all about US basketball, even telling jokes and using appropriate slang/jargon--that was a treat!). We also visited the Reina Sofia and Prado museums just to see the highlights; again, not hugely impressed (but I know I'm in the minority! My favorite museum anywhere in the world is the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the d'Orsay and Marmottan in Paris). I wish we had spent some time in Retiro Park--I think that would have added to our enjoyment of Madrid. Plenty of sidewalk cafes for eating or just having drinks. Excellent transportation system, too--no problem using the trains or buses (didn't try the metro).

I love going to Madrid, I stay mainly at the Barrio de Salamanca, beautiful streets and avenues, very good for shopping, many and of every kind of restaurant, and with the best private art galleries. The Prado and Thyssen are very near along the Castellana/ Recoletos /paseo del Prado axis, with buses constantly passing. I do not go to the Reina Sofia at all, and I dont like Plaza Mayor and Madrid antiguo. Occasionally I go to Princesa street.

Madrid is much more modern than most european capitols (lots of 1920/30's highrises - kind of like Chicago). It is also very hot in the summer and there is a very active nightlife that tends to end (loudly) about 5 am.

IMHO there is enough to fill 2 days plus a day trip to Toledo - but it is dfinitely my least favorite european city.

(Caveat: when you live in New York modern neighborhoods, great shopping and restaurants and tons of galleries to tour are not something you want to go thousands of miles for.)

Madrid is on its way to becoming a destination city much like Paris has been for the last 150 years, and like Paris, if you know where and when to go you'll always find something interesting going on. With its restaurants being influenced by Basque, Navarran, Galician and Catalán fare, there are now more great places to sample some of Spain's great cuisine. It’s too bad that most people's experience and expectations of the city are so limited. It will never be Paris, but being Madrid should be enough.

Sorry, but I do NOT think "New York" when I am in Madrid...I wish New York LOOKED that great!

I agree with those who enjoyed the wide boulevards, the various leafy streets, the world-class museums (there are few, if ANY museums in the US which can match the Prado for works on view IMO), the Royal Palace, etc.

It will probably still be hot in Madrid in September but it is much drier than in other parts of Spain (e.g., Barcelona).

I enjoy the overall ambience of the city, too.

Frankly, I think you'll have a very positive experience as long as you don;t go there expecting it to be something it isn't.

"Honest opinion on Madrid??"
Madrileños have a saying: De Madrid al Cielo (from Madrid to Heaven). Maybe the lack of positive feedback is because people who have spent more than a few days in Madrid fall in love with the City and don't want to share their feelings with just anyone ...

Do a little research before you go: try to lay out a few walking tours (Palacio Réal - Oriente - Opera - C/Mayór and Plaza Mayór up to the Puerta del Sol, for example).

Is this the kind of feedback you want, or are you looking for nightlife??

Madrid is also great as a break from much more expensive places. You can get a good meal for a lot less than in the other big cities in Europe such as London, Paris, Munich, or Rome. Try some paella and some local wine. The Prado is very impressive and Retiro Park is a very relaxing place to stay cool on a hot day.

Baldworth

Even though I am not in LOVE with Madrid, I have really enjoyed my visits. I think that - aside from world-class museums and stunning little museums - it is more about lifestyle/ambiance than architecture. Madrid is not 'quaint', it has a strong personality.

The food is amazing and nightlife is vibrant. People are elegant.

If you find yourself not falling in love while there you can always hop on a bus or train and head for Segovia, Avila, Toledo, or (my favorite but a bit of a stretch for a daytrip) Cuenca.

If you need any help on restaurants, hotel locations, shopping tips, etc, please let me know...

I liked Madrid much more than I expected to in my brief stopover last month. It was very hot during the day but the evenings were extremely pleasant, and the definition of evening there stretches way beyond my usual time frame.

The Plaza Santa Ana has a terrific atmosphere with outdoor cafes, street vendors, musicians, dancers... Near there is the Cafe Central, a jazz club with live music every night from 10 to midnight that looked like fun although we didn't go inside, opting instead for dinner at a nearby restaurant. Around the corner from that, we went to the midnight show at a flamenco club, Casa Patas, which was great fun.

We enjoyed exhibits at the Prado and Reina Sofia museums.

We got many ideas for Madrid from Maribel's wonderful online guide.

www.maribelsguides.com

Although Madrid isn't my favourite European city (that would be either Barcelona or Copenhagen), I have enjoyed my short visits there (5 business trips, one week language course, 2 days during our honeymoon).

It has a great nightlife, in terms of cafés, tapas bars, restaurants and clubs. You can fit in a whole extra day's worth of travel experience into Madrid, because the city keeps going all night. This can work well for you if you're a little jet-lagged from your trip from North America since your body will think its 6-9 hours earlier than it is in Madrid. That means you'll be able to keep up with the Madrilenos - a tour of tapas bars at 8 pm, dinner at 10:30 and dancing from 1 am until dawn. I once remember leaving my hotel at 6 am on a weekday to catch an early flight home, and seeing a lot of people on the street (not just club kids; businesspeople, too) heading home from a night out.

If you have already adjusted to European time when you get to Madrid, resist any temptation you might feel to have an early (by Spanish standards) dinner and then call it an early night. Take a nap in the late afternoon/early evening, and don't plan on eating dinner before 10 pm. (Even 10 pm is early in some restaurants.) Otherwise, you could end up sitting in the restaurant alone - or only in the company of other tourists. If you're hungry, there is always another tapas bar to keep you fuelled until dinner time.

Madrid is also worth the visit just for its art museums. Everyone should see Picasso's Guernica - and the associated exhibition that shows you how Picasso developed the painting - at least once. And the Goyas are also fascinating.

Thank you all for your imput!!

OMG! Do not eat paella in Madrid! Unless there is some amazing Paella restaurant that is owned and operated by Valencians (and you better go with the address and phone number) you are going to get a big skillet of nasty.

I recently fell in love with Madrid after about 8 years of dislike. Why? It is beautiful and quite dignified. There is a lot to do and there is a lot to see, but you can also just "waste" time walking around and not feel at all like you are missing something. It is one of those places that offers you whatever you want, so go knowing what you want (relaxation, museums, theatre, shopping, etc) and get it.

a drink or coffee at dusk/night behind the opera at a cafe overlooking the gardens of the royal palace is worth every moment of a stopover just for that.

i enjoy the museo de las descalzas near pl. santa ana, a real gem, the museum triangle and pehaps a show of somesort.

the toursit bus does a great on and off tour which can be used for your general transportation around the city.

the fundacion march might have a recital or interesting exhibit while you are there. and the national library is always some place i try to stop at as many of the free exhibits there have been fabulous.

It took me a few trips to Madrid for some reason to get it, but on my trip last June I really loved it! Great comments here; want to also emphasize to get into Madrid "time" ASAP for maximum enjoyment.

The energy of the city and the people, the vibrant nightlife, the interesting diversity of food now available (agree with skipping the paella in Madrid, however!), gorgeous lit-up fountains, the variety of amazing art in galleries & museums (including the interesting and blessedly quiet archeological museum), the Retiro, and some very fun shopping, both cheap and chic...you can really enjoy this city if you take it on its own terms and don't expect it to be/look like other more picturesque places in Spain.

Dukey -

The Prado is fine for what it is - but it comes nowhere near the Met (which is in the class of the Louvre or Hermitage) nor MoMA. Never mind the dozens of other museums NYC has and the literally hundreds of galleries.

I'm not saying Madrid is an awful place. but I go to europe for what is different than the US - old, historic, reflecting a different culture, different ethnicities etc.

I adore spain. I love Andalusia and enjoy Barcelona. And have also enjoyed some more off the tourist track places like Merida and Ubeda and San Sebastian.

It's just that for me - Madrid lacks the "difference" that you find in many other parts of Spain - and in fact in most parts of europe.

My husband and I were in Spain in May. He had never been to Madrid so we decided to start there for 5 nights then went to Sevilla for 3 and Barcelona for the last 5. We had the same concerns about Madrid that you did but ended up loving it. We both liked Madrid, much much better than Barcelona. Barcelona has great architecture and is worth going just for that but it was filled with tourists and I didn't think the night life or restaurants came close to those of Madrid. It was a pleasant surprise for us nonetheless.

Probably what I liked best about Madrid was the people and general atmosphere. It was so much fun to see people of all ages (even little kids and babies) hanging out in cafes late into the evening, taking strolls on the boulevards and just enjoying their city.

We stayed at the Hotel Mario up by the Opera which was a good budget hotel. I liked that area a lot as the Plaza d'Oriente in front of the Palace is around the corner and a lovely place to have a drink or just sit and people watch.

Some things we enjoyed doing - strolling around the city, going to the Prado (I agree it doesn't have the variety of art the Met has but it is unbeatable with respect to Spanish art - Velasquez, Goya), the Retiro Park, going to the old bars/tapas restaurants). We also went to a couple of smaller museums that I really enjoyed. I will write more details when I'm home (posting from work) and can look at my travel notes. I didn't care much for the Thyssen Museum. I found the collection to be very thin.

If you are planning to go to Toledo, we did, I would go early in the morning or arrive in the afternoon to avoid the crowds. It is a tiny city with winding streets made considerably less charming by the bus loads of school kids and other tourists packed in during mid-day. And since all the museums and even the cathedral close around lunch time, there is really no where to go.

I find Madrid thrilling -- but I like to have afternoon coffee and twillight cocktails in swank places, eat tapas, stay up late for dinner and in general enjoy the glamour of a prosperious capital. To me, the Prado is the finest museum in Europe, hands down. The Thyssen-Bournemisza is another excellent museum. If art is important to you, do not fail to see the church of San Francisco el Grande, whose interior dome was painted by Goya.

I did not care for my tour of the Royal Palace, but I almost never like touring royal palaces with their excessive decoration. I more enjoyed crawling around the small but interesting Temple Debold.

I think Toledo is a great day trip from Madrid, even though there are not many good restaurants there. In fact, overnighting there is something I would like to do.

The last time I was in Madrid I stayed in the Gran Hotel Conde Duque and found the location and rooms extremely pleasant. It's just slightly removed from the tourist quarter, but just steps from the San Bernardo metro stop in an elegant neighborhood filled with elegant restaurants and buildings. I got a good rate through Holiday City (also try Bookings.es)

http://www.jpmoser.com/granhotelcondeduque.html

Madrid also has the best metro system I have encountered in Europe.

Sound like Barcelona would be best with teens/tweens however, right?

PS: I'm sorry but I was born in New York City and have lived here most of my life, and spend most of my time in museums. I have no idea why NYtraveler thinks the Prado doesn't compare with the Metropolitan in New York. Both are great museums, and would even give the Prado the edge for its concentration of masterpieces Phillipe de Montebello would give his left arm to have.

And if I didn't like great urban capitals, I wouldn't live in one. Madrid -- like London, like Tokyo, like Milano -- is so much better than New York, it is a real pleasure to go there if you live here, and experience modern urbanism that is truly enjoyable.

missypie,

I think that's probably right, although I would also take a look at Andalucia and the Basque country (San Sebastian) if you are trying to figure out where best to go in Spain. I wouldn't do the Basque country outside of summer, however, and I wouldn't do Andalucia in summer (too hot).

This is a March trip, yes? I'd consider Andalucia over Barcelona, because I think the best of Barcelona is its location by the sea, and in March you may not have many opportunities to enjoy outdoor dining, etc.

The Op says the trip is in September, not March.

Say what you will about the Met in New York (which could easily fit INSIDE the Louvre with plenty of room left over) so I guess we'll just have to continue disagreeing about whether or not Madrid is "worth it."

laclaire writes: "OMG! Do not eat paella in Madrid! Unless there is some amazing Paella restaurant that is owned and operated by Valencians (and you better go with the address and phone number) you are going to get a big skillet of nasty."

The Chef at el Pato Mudo (mute duck) in the Hotel Diana, near Barajas airport. is from Valencia and he turns out a pretty good Paella: just tell him what variety you want (i.e., Typical Valencia or Madrileña). The former is mostly mariscos, the latter: de pollo.

I love Madrid but it's probably because I met my husband-to-be while on vacation there!

Well - we'll have to disagree - to me New York has a wonderful heart and soul - while Madrid is cold and without much personality.

As to the museums - the Prado is too much of a muchness - the Met - which includes the Cloisters had a much greater variety - and the other Museums in New York have dozens of times the exhibits - and life of Madrid.

As for cafes, drinks, clubs etc - no other city can match New York - it is the capitol of the world in so many fields (finance, education, medicine, publishing, fashion etc) - and not just size and diversity of so many natinoalities - that Madrid is not even in the same category. I always think of it as one of the secondary cities (like Munich or Amsterdam or perhaps Florence - but I really think florence has more to see/do) rather than top tier cities like London, Paris, Rome, Prague or St Pet.

It may be a great place to live - but tourists aren;t looking for the same thing that residents are.

But then - I've only been three times (twice on business). Everyone should try each city at least once so they can make up their own minds.

"Typical Valencia or Madrileña). The former is mostly mariscos, the latter: de pollo."
Nedsireland, I just don't know if I understood the phrase, I always mess up with words like former and latter :) Does it says that typical Valencia is mostly mariscos and Madrileña de pollo ? It's just the contrary ! I thought "former" meant the first thing you mention, am I right ? Thanks for the English lesson, I know it's off topic, sorry !!

I loved the nightlife in madrid, the tapas were incredible. As far as the city itself- besides the prada, it was nothin special to me. It is the only city in europe where someone tried to rob us, unsuccesfully, i might add. Im glad I went but have little desire to go back.

Nytraveler:
I am so glad you LOVE the city you live in - perhaps that's why you chose to live there - so good for you. However when one travels, one should keep an open mind to the whole experience and try not to compare it to the city of your heart.
Each city has its good and bad side and I am sure NY can be pretty bad in some places - in fact, we've wandered into a few!

Personally, like you I love NY - we go every November just to shop, walk around the neighborhoods, eat and stay at my favorite hotel! BUT I prefer to live in San Francisco - the city of MY heart.

We also go to Paris for its romance, London for its culture, Rome for its history and on and on. We're headed to Madrid in November and I am looking forward to all it has to offer.

I repeat my offer. If you need any advice on hotel, restaurants, shops...just ask!!

Thank you, Carlota. Personally, I think Madrid is a great city; I have been a few times and plan to go back in the not-too-distant- future. For anyone interested, the new Conde Nast Traveler magazine has a feature on the city written by Gully Wells.

Hi Carlota!
I will take you up on your offer.. We will be in Madrid in November for the entire week - we were going to split the time between Madrid and Seville but then decided to just take it easy.
We have reservations at the De Las Letras - this after searching thru this site and TripAdvisor and this one had a really good rating - do you have any comments and or suggestions - places to eat, see besides the typical touristy stuff?

Carlota, me too! I'll be in Madrid in November too, staying at the Lope de Vega and looking for good food nearby (or within a reasonable walk for a girl traveling solo!)

Hi,

I'm in Madrid right now staying at hotel Villa Real( free internet!). I love Madrid! I have lost track of how many times I have been here but every time I come I like it more.

Spent today approx. 4 hrs in Prado museum where they have a special Picasso exhibit. The Prado museum never ceases to amaze me. We also spent some time in Retiro Park, walking in the shady areas mostly due to the hot ( but not humid) weather. Stpped at one of the cafes by the lake and had the best cafe con leche ever!

Tomorrow we are planning to go to Avila.

Don't hesitate about coming, it's a great city!

Hi cruiseluv,
Glad to hear from you and to find that you've had a great time in the city that I love so much.

keystoney,
I'm such an avid fan of the city that I wrote a 76 page file about it! If you need any restaurant, sightseeing, hotel, tapas bar, nightlife recommendations, you can download it at www.maribelsguides.com

"Hello. I'll be in Madrid in mid September and I'm not hearing a lot of possitive feedback about the city. Can you tell me about the 'good' experiences you've had and ideas on what to do?"

Madrid is the most boring capital in Europe. It has no natural beauty, very little history (it's only a few hundred years old) and few if any interesting sights. It's only plus is its proximity to Toledo. Otherwise, get out ASAP and head to Andalucia or Barcelona.

keystonev & others interested in Madrid, definitely look at anything Maribel refers you to; she is one of the many generous Spain 'experts' on this site. Some of the best advice I've found at Fodors has come from all of you Spain lovers!

kenderina, you've got it; former means the first thing mentioned (think "f" for former/first) and latter is the last thing mentioned (think "l" for latter/last).

Boy, I can understand some of the reasons people may not warm up to Madrid (see my own comments on my first trips above) or take a while to do so, but "boring" is odd to me. I must have just been lucky hitting some pretty wonderful, eclectic and non-stop night life and meeting lively and dynamic people...