Our next stop was Madrid! We found the city to be very different than Barcelona, but still beautiful. We visited all of the biggest sites, like the Royal Palace and the El Prado museum (top and bottom left photos). We also enjoyed simply walking around the city, as our hotel was in the center of the cultural and tourist hub of Madrid!

Inside the Royal Palace, there were so many gorgeous pieces of art and plenty to admire. The information in our Rick Steves book helped us to understand the most notable and important aspects of each room. It was truely a place to admire, and you could take an exciting photo anywhere you looked.

While in Madrid, we spent plenty of time walking around to explore the local scenery. We found a park just below the Royal Palace that we later strolled through, meeting many cute dogs along the way (top left and bottom right photos). We also took a tour (In Spanish!) of the kitchen under the Royal Palace, where Camille became an unofficial translator for the other Americans in the tour group. Pictured in the top right is Camille pretending to use what we call a "Butter Cutter Inner," a posed photo as a family joke because of the silly name we give it. On the bottom left is Camille and Nancy on the roof of the hotel, where we got a free drink for saving energy and resources not using room service - a pretty good deal if you ask me!