Madrid museum friendly studio apartment rentals
 

Does anyone have any apartment or studio rental suggestions in the museum triangle area? I will need to be close to the museums on my next trip, but it seems a waste to book a two bedroom unit as I will be traveling solo.

and your length of stay and budget is?

Two week stay. As for budget, I would like to keep costs lower than what I have spent at the Westin Palace in the past, which was pretty pricey for my budget.

There are plenty of hotels in the area where you won't pay The Palace's prices. We like the Hotel Mora on Paseo del Prado. A giggle:- my husband stayed at The Palace for a month in '61. He only paid $5/night. Them were the days !

"them were the days" was in Franco's Spain. Good thing they are gone.

Spain Select has some smaller apt. for about 95 euros a night..

http://mlr-apartamentosmadrid.es/es/apartments
I have tried to stay here on C/Almirante but the dates were never right!
I love this apt and the fact it is an easy walk from the airport bus and to the museums!
The owner has other apts but this one is the best.She answers emails very promptly

Danon, how very PC of you !

Nothing PC about it.
I detest fascism even at $5/ a night.

Here's another great studio on C/Cervantes, safe, quiet great location for the museums.I stay just up the street and have eaten breakfast just across the street!.Once again, my favorite location! I've used this website before w/no problems:
http://www.homeaway.com/vacation-rental/p1556329#map

Thank you all for the suggestions. They look wonderful! It is nice to have options from those in the know. :-)

I didn't mean to start a political discussion of fascism, and I didn't take Bedar's comment as support of Franco's Spain in any way. I just took it as a reflection of the fact that what I have paid to stay there in the more recent past is, at least for many of us, fairly steep.

Right, Nepenthe, I was simply contrasting prices of yesteryear with today's. Guess the person wanted to show they knew a little bit of history. Up until, say, 2010, we stayed at a hostal directly across from The Palace - $29 for a double with bath and a large terrace. Everyone we sent there loved it. Unhappily it closed. Think the owner died. So it goes.

We've rented thrust VRBO quite a few times and stayed at this apartment last summer.

http://www.vrbo.com/178291

While the photos make it look dark, there are several narrow floor to ceiling windows in the kitchen/dining area and when the outside shades are up or curtains open it's quite nice and airy. Also there is an elevator and apartment faces an inside area so very quite. Also, excellent communications with the owner made the rental process very easy.

I know this sounds like an advertisement but this has been one of our favorite rentals.

Not sure where you're traveling from but we were able to take the metro to/from the airport and it was an 10 minute walk from Puerta del Sol. Great location, and many restaurants & cafes nearby for good food and people watching while enjoying the evening or afternoon. We walked everywhere and didn't have to use the metro to get around. We'd definitely stay here again.

Enjoy your stay in Madrid.

....hmm located on C/Huertas!

We just returned from Madrid and stayed at this wonderful one-bedroom Airbnb called the Prado Museum Apartment at $100 a night. Cesar and Ana, the owners of the rental apt, live on the same floor and they were very helpful. The apartment was delightful...a very short walk from the Prado, Reina Sofia, Atocha. Here's the link. https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/339171?...4-718182354770. Highly recommend.

chapla, why the hmmm? Just curious as we found it a great area and thoroughly enjoyed our stay.

I love the area but stopped loving the street Huertas a few years ago.I started staying there because of its closeness to the museum but I finally couldn't sleep-even w/earplugs! The noise-shouting,singing, screaming ,garbage trucks until 5 AM.It all just got too much.I loved the studio apt and was sorry to stop staying there on my monthly visits to Madrid but it has lost its charm-in the mornining not pleasant to see all the vomit!So I discovered the streets of Lope de Vega,Cervantes and Leon and absolutely love the little shops,cafes etc.It's just a couple of streets over from Huertas but totally calmer with more local residents. I also don't miss the steep walk up Huertas!
I see the apt you stayed in is an interior one and I'm sure that helped to not put up with the noise but I don't like interior apts.I don't enjoy looking out at other people's windows or airshafts.
Huertas started out great when it first became a pedestrian stree with all those famous quotations in the side walk but ithas become known as the street w/the most bars in Madrid! Lots of young people just seem to hang out and pass the time drinking,having theirown 'botellon'-not for me!

auntieapple,
That place looks wonderful! I just sent an email to the owners and may stay there! Looks perfect for us! Thanks for the link.

Paule

progol- be careful-get ready for noise!It says it's on C/Jesus but it's actually on the corner w/Huertas!
That's the same building I stayed in for years but gave up on because of the noise....there is A/C but it is controlled by the building and turned off at night!!!
It's also across from a children's playground and a couple of doors down is a very busy police station!!!!!

I forgot to mention that the huge garbage containers are across the street-usually overflowing!

Thanks, Chapla, I appreciate your candor. I'm torn now, the reviews on AirBnB are uniformly excellent, so I'm a little confused.

auntieapple - what was your experience with garbage in the streets and the noise? I see the bedroom faces the back so reviews say it's okay for sleeping.

https://maps.google.com/maps?biw=967...ed=0CAYQ_AUoAQ

You can see the playground and the residents lined up in the street protesting the level of noise!
I stayed in that great building on the fourth floor 8 times until it got unbearable.A pity because it used to be wonderful!
During the summer months when you need the A/C it's powered down by the wishes of the building association. Because of the noise, opening the windows just increased the noise level!
If the bedroom faces the inner courtyard it may indeed not be that bad a problem.I would ask the owner about the actual location/ floor.I think from the configuration of the building it may face C/Fucar which is not pedestrian and therfore traffic and it will face the bars!

I forgot to add,lots of goings on in Spain w/AirBnB-not good!

Chapla, I did not see the playground or residents protesting from the above link or did I misunderstand something?

Google acts up sometimes!
Go to google,type in the address Calle Jesus de Fucar 5 Madrid.
Play around with the street and acroos from the building, there's the playground.The people are lined up w/ barricades!

chapla, I did see the people and park. A noise protest? What happened? It must've been sometime in the wintertime, as people are all bundled up.

I still see many positive reviews of the apartment and the location on AirBnb & TA (not listed on booking.com), so it can't be that bad. We will be there in May, so the A/C issue being turned down at night could be an issue, though.

auntieapple, if you can add anything to this discussion, I'd appreciate it!

Paule

Paule, from personal experience,I know reviews can be misleading- I take reviews w/a pinch of salt! For example, noise is NOT an issue for many people.The buildingis a nice one and as mentioned I enjoyed staying there months at a time. I had many conversations w/residents and the part time doorman.The second floor is a business and the employees have a bad habit of propping open the entrance door to avoid buzzing each other in so there goes the security!I always threw away the brick and closed the door!
The playground is used pretty much all day/night.
If the noise is not an issue for you then go for it.Because the street is so busy you will feel "safe"t all hours but be careful when entering the building because the lobby is dark,the lights are on a timer and there maybe non residents sitting on the couches!
By the way, the apt is priced high-I paid 40 euros a night,1000 euros a month.There are 5 other apts that I know of that are rented by the day/week/month in the building.

Save your money for the moment. Tourism is down in Spain because of the ebola crisis. My daughter just wrote from Madrid and said "everyone is freaking out everywhere.". Saw the riots there on PBS today. Basically over the nurse's dog having been put down and the state of health care but ...

Those people appear to be waiting for a procession or parade of some sort. The picture is dated March 2014, I wonder if there was some sort of procession to Atocha station to remember the 2004 bombings.

Just hypothesizing.

Interesting rialtogirl. There doesn't seem to be anything that indicates what is going on, so that makes sense to me.

I'm going in May -- by that time, I hope, the Ebola scare will have calmed down. At least in Spain.

Makes NO sense rialtogirl!
Not even that close to Atocha station or even a procession.Follow the lines and you will see where they start/stop.If you know the area, people are constantly protesting the NOISE and the lack of GARBAGE collection and that's why they bring chairs and the police put up barriers!

I am in Madrid right now....full of tourists, no sales anywhere, restaurants and bars doing well.
Yes, traffic was bad today because of " dog demonstration" but have not seen any " freaking out" yet.
Actually, Spain 's economy has been improving( according to the Economist):
"In Brussels these days Spain is hailed as a prodigal son of the euro zone’s troubled southern periphery. The economy returned to growth in the third quarter of 2013, with rising exports compensating for weak consumer and public spending. The Madrid stockmarket is booming, foreign investors are back, the current account is in surplus, bond yields have hit eight-year lows and new jobs are being created. It adds up to big progress in a country that once threatened to break apart the euro."

I guess we just had a lucky week + in the rental on Huertas that I posted a link to. Never saw garbage piled up, this area was not full of bars and drinking, noise or riots. There was a very peaceful protest of sorts one afternoon at Puerta del Sol but nothing to make one uneasy. We enjoyed the cafes nearby to sit, have a drink or tapas and people watch. And we were there during a very hot week in Julne and found the AC worked well enough for us with no problem. Personally we don't need a scenic view, for us it usually equates to street noise in vital, living cities, would take a courtyard anytime. This is only my opinion.

Nepenthe, I hope you keep an open mind and find an apartment you enjoy. Have a great time.

Thank you so much, wunderbar. I truly appreciate all of the suggestions, and I realize that personal tastes do vary quite a bit when it comes to finding places to stay when traveling. :)

I really like the idea of being able to travel to and from the airport via the metro, though!

For what it's worth, I've been in touch with several folks that stayed in the apartment that auntieapple (above) recommends and they highly recommend it, too. I'm told the bedroom is away from the front and is quiet; they didn't experience any significant crowds or garbage; and found the owner of the apartment (1-bedroom, not studio) to be very helpful (and lives in the building, too).

Regarding the link to the street, calle de jesus, and the "noise protest" (see chapla's link above), I also suspect that this is a procession, not protest. There are no political signs, indicating protest; there are only older and younger people waiting, it appears, patiently; and if you do follow the barricades, they stop at the church at the intersection of Cervantes and Calle (or Plaza) de Jesus. Following Cervantes, there are some barricades set up and ribbons (ties) forming another boundary; and then there are a fair number of barricades set up along Paseo del Prado. Doesn't look like a protest to me.

Just my opinion. I've booked there for my stay in May.