I’m going to ignore for the time being that I have left Madrid and that I won’t be returning. That doesn’t feel real yet. In fact, it’s interesting, since the last month I spent in Madrid was unlike any other, really it was so different it’s unbelievable.
Well first off, I’ll just give you all a brief summary of how I spent my time between when my mom and sister left to return back to Canada in early June and when I finally left Madrid on July 2nd. Essentially I spend most of my days on my own, since most of my friends had already taken off, though I did see friends and spend a fair bit of time with them as well. During this alone-time, however, I took advantage to go and visit museums, lots and lots of museums in Madrid. I also took the time to go on some trips, lasting no more than two days, but trips nevertheless in order to see some more of Spain before my eventual departure. And even after departing Madrid on July 2nd, I spent a week in Spain, in Valencia and Tarragona, before finally embarking on a bus journey from Barcelona to Toulouse and settling here, from where I am writing now, before continuing my summer.
So essentially, I visited Segovia and Salamanca (which you can read about HERE), Santiago de Compostela, A Coruña (which you can read about HERE), and Valencia and Tarragona during my last month in Spain, and of course I did more exploring of Madrid and its surroundings, which I’ll talk about here too, but I will not yet discuss Madrid and how much this city means to me here, well not yet anyways.
So let’s start with my final explorations of MY city. I visited countless museums, among them an abandoned metro station, the train museum (museo del ferrocarril), a natural science museum, the Prado (again), the Thyssen-Bormeszina museum, just to name a few, and frankly I probably visited more just I don’t remember.
Here are a few photos, just to give you an idea:
Oh, and I visited the Circulo de Bellas Artes, probably the best lookout in the entire city!
About ten days after that Galicia trip, I left Madrid, for good. My last night in Madrid was amazing, I spent it at Cofi with some friends, including Myrthe who introduced me to the bar and was also leaving shortly, and Antonio was so sad to see us leave he kept preparing us free sangrias, truly the sweetest man ever.
Finally on Saturday July 2nd at 3 PM I left Madrid, accompanied by my Portuguese friend Filipa, and we caught at Blablacar and headed to Valencia for a beach vacation there. It was my second time in Valencia, however I did not get the opportunity to visit the downtown much during my first visit, so it was a good opportunity for me to get to know the city a little bit better. Oh, and once again, the Valencian beach was BEAUTIFUL (not like I have any pictures of it this time…)!
I had some paella while there as well, and that last picture is of fideua, also typical Valencian and it was delicious.
Finally, my last stop in Spain was to Tarragona. Not a spectacular city in terms of architecture, but it did feature a Roman forum, and its beaches were also incredible. Let’s just say my last week in Spain was a nice beach vacation, and the water was actually really warm!
I guess no better way to leave Spain, right, than to spend a week on the beach? I mean, in the year I spent living in Madrid I saw way more of Spain than I’ve ever seen of Canada (probably since the country is much smaller and it’s a lot cheaper to move around) and I must say that I have fallen in love with its culture, its customs, its food, its ambiance and pretty much everything there is to see there. I will soon write about how Madrid changed my life, but in the meantime it’s time to share how much I enjoyed the rest of the country.
I’m in France now living another amazing experiences, and I booked my flight home, August 22nd from Brussels, so Montreal, I guess we’ll see each other soon…
-Daniele
