Now in Madrid

Christmas was very quiet in Lisbon, in fact on Christmas eve the whole place was like a ghost town! Christmas day was sunny & bright & we managed to get our day started with bubbles! We walked up to the Castle where you had a great view over the city.

A flight of one hour bought us to Madrid & what a difference! So much colder & so many people. There are Tapas bars everywhere and most of them have hams hanging above the bars.People were out in the squares in their hundreds & they have a strange, perhaps Christmas ritual, of wearing strange hats and bright coloured wigs but at least there are Christmas decorations up. We read that Spanish children do not get their presents until 6th January.
We used the 'Hop on hop off' bus to do a tour of the city. Got talking to a Spanish lady about how many people were about & she said " There is no money but we are out"! Queues to buy lottery tickets were amazingly long - perhaps that's the way to sort out the financial crisis!
After a very cold bus trip we arrived at a Square near the apartment and watched the people before finding the market which was actually a massive tapas area. After a couple of circuits we worked out what to do & ended standing with hundreds of others with a glass of wine in one hand & a plate of food inn the other!