Category Archives: 2026

8th February 2025: La Cúpula – “Opera & Brunch”, Hotel Palace (Madrid, Spain)

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When I have a “big oh” birthday, I go climb a volcano, when my sibling does, we go for high-end brunch. Not that I am going to complain, at all – I get to tag along. The day, however, could have started better. We left 30 minutes behind schedule, then we ran into a traffic jam in the highway and finally, when we reached Madrid, we could not access the parking lot we had planned because not all the street closures had been published on the town hall’s website. We managed to find a different place to drop off the car, fortunately, but none of us was really wearing walking shoes…

Everything got better when we reached The Palace Hotel, officially The Palace, a Luxury Collection Hotel, Madrid, colloquially El Palace. This five-star hotel was established in 1912. It is both a Spanish Cultural Asset (BIC) and part of the Unesco Heritage Site Paseo del Prado and Buen Retiro, a landscape of Arts and Sciences. The Palace is recognised as the first luxury hotel built in Spain, erected as an early 20th response to the new ways of travelling and King Alfonso XIII’s efforts to modernise Spain, which had previously been considered an “exotic and a bit dangerous” country to travel. The building was designed by architect Leon Eduard Ferrés i Puig in the Beaux-Arts style, one of the multiple “neo” fads from the 19th century, drawing from French Neoclassicism, Renaissance and Baroque whilst at the same time using new building materials – reinforced concrete, iron, steel and glass (another grand example of this style is the Casino in Monte-Carlo).

Historically, The Palace Hotel has hosted national and international names of renown – Spanish artists such as Picasso, Dalí and Lorca, composers like Igor Stravinsky and Richard Strauss, scientist Marie Curie, and showbiz personalities including Josephine Baker, Rita Hayworth and Ava Gardner. Today, El Palace is part of one of the Marriott brands, and after an integral renovation between 2023 and 2025, it comprises 470 rooms and 51 suites across 6,000 square metres on six floors. It is also home to several gastronomic spots: a high-end Chinese restaurant (China Taste by El Bund), a cocktail bar (27 Club) and a flexible restaurant and bar – La Cúpula, so called because it sits in a rotunda underneath the iconic stained glass dome (cúpula in Spanish) and skylight that has become the “heart of the hotel”.

There are also several works of art scattered around the hotel, and just past the lobby, I almost walked into one I was not expecting at all – “The Palace Dino”, El Dino del Palace, a sculpture by Lázaro Rosa-Violán depicting… a spinosaurid dinosaur. The piece is a scaled-down marble skeleton of an outdated interpretation of Spinosaurus aegyptiacus (Cretaceous period) with a thick tail and a bony crest. I say “outdated” because Spinosaurus was discovered in the early 1910s and for a while, it was described as bipedal theropod. Two skeletons were recovered in Egypt but kept in Nazi Germany and destroyed during WWI, so nobody could study them further. Later, in the 21st century, a proposed neotype was unearthed, this time in Morocco. Subsequent discoveries hinted that the animal was actually both quadrupedal and semi aquatic. In 2005, a Spanish spinosaurid was discovered in La Rioja area and named Riojavenatrix lacustris (Lake huntress from La Rioja) – I may have worked on a fossilised piece of bone of this animal in Loarre. I was really surprised to find any dinosaur connection in such a place, but I have exactly zero problems with it.

simplified skeleton of a dinosaur with a sort-of-sail

Dinosaur hype aside, every Sunday afternoon between 13:30 and 16:30, La Cúpula offers an event called Opera & brunch, with a self-service buffet and professional opera singers popping up to delight the attendees with several arias by famous maestros. The crowd was extremely diverse – from middle-aged couples to families with children to solo-diners. When I grow up, I want to be like the lady sitting on her own at the next table, whom both waiters and singers stopped to greet and welcome.

Bar in the centre of a rotunda, covered by a skylight

For now, however, I don’t think I can afford the price tag, which might be steep for some pockets – but as I said, milestone birthday. We had chosen the Deluxe Opera & Brunch, which is 125 € per person. There is a more expensive option which includes a lot more alcohol. Despite its given name, the affair is not really a brunch, but a full-blown lunch.

Waiters serve sparkling wine (cava) and water, and they focus more on the wine than the water, which is slightly inconvenient for a non-alcohol-drinker like myself. Food is organised in a buffet-corner, divided in three spaces. The first one is the “self-service area”: artisan cheeses, Iberian sausages – including a hand-cut ham leg (100% acorn-fed Iberian breed) – baked goods, seafood and raw bar, with lobster and oysters, salad bar and a “hot buffet” with roasted suckling pig and side dishes of potatoes, peppers and chickpeas. In another area stood the live cooking stations, manned by people serving the food: roasted sea bass, beef Wellington and a rice station (paella); an egg station was advertised, but it was not there – hence not a brunch: no option of eggs Benedict. Finally, there was a desserts table with mini cakes, pies, tartelettes, verrines, chocolates, and macarons. I learnt the names of so many desserts that day…

Lady cutting a cured pork leg, and several stations of a buffet, including cooked meat, seafood and oysters

Cold meats and cheese, salad, and dessert stations in a buffet

The music program included a pianist, a soprano and a tenor, and we had a little sheet of paper with the setlist:
 Non ti scordar di me (Don’t forget me) by Ernesto de Curtis (1935).
 Ebben? Ne andrò lontana (Well, then? I’ll go far away) from La Wally by Alfredo Catalani (1892).
 Musica Proibita (Forbidden Music) by Stanislao Gastaldon (1881).
 Io son l’umile ancella (I am the humble servant of the creative spirit) from Adriana Lecouvreur by Francesco Cilea (1902).
 Eri tu (It’s you) from Un ballo in maschera by Giuseppe Verdi (1859).
 Il bacio (The Kiss) by Luigi Arditi (1860).
 Mattinata (Morning) by Ruggero Leoncavallo (1904).
 Die lustige Witwe Waltz (Waltz of the Merry Widow) by Franz Lehár (1861).
 Amapola (Poppy) by Joseph Lacalle (1920).
 O sole mio (Oh my sunshine) by Eduardo Di Capua (1989).
 Granada by Agustín Lara (1932).
 Nessun dorma (Let no one sleep) from Turandot by Giacomo Puccini (1926).
 Brindisi (Toast or Driking Song) from La Traviata by Giuseppe Verdi (1853).

Man playing a grand piano

Tenor and soprano singing The Toast from La Traviatta. The soprano is saluting the camera with her glass

The singers and the pianist were excellent. The only complaint I could have is that we were seated right behind the piano, and the artists were on the other side, so their voices did not carry that well, but once the soprano came to sing to us and that was great. I moved at some point so I could hear them better, too (and take pictures). The food was abundant and quite good – I even tried an oyster for the first time. Truth be told, I would have liked to taste a bit of each dish – everything looked delicious – but there was just too much! The sitting and bar area looked beautiful, and there was even a bit of a Chinese New Year decoration (since China Taste is doing a special menu to celebrate). I particularly loved the skylight dome above the bar.

Skylight with a hanging lamp

It was a great event that we could have complemented with something else nearby – the Naval Museum, or the Palace of Cibeles. However, my parents had been so stressed by the drive that they did not want to stay over. Besides, we had eaten a lot. The most reasonable course of events was heading home for a food coma, after deciding that maybe – just maybe – Sunday mornings were not the best to drive around Madrid.

31st January 2026: Mistakes were made around the Tercios (Madrid, Spain)

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A local cultural association organised a day trip to Madrid on the 31st of January to witness the historical re-enactment Día de Los Tercios (Tercios Day). Tercios (thirds) were the Spanish Empire’s infantry force, usually considered to be the origin of modern European armies. They were formed by volunteers-turned-professional soldiers, the elite of the Spanish military.

Despite their 1534 establishment as an actual unit, the strategies and structure of the Tercios can be traced to the 1480s, when the Christians were trying to conquer Grenada from the Arabs. They were known for effectively mixing bladed weapons, usually pikes, and firearms (primitive rifles known as arquebuses). They had a very characteristic hierarchy system in which old soldiers trained newcomers. They had rankings amongst themselves, medical staff, chaplains, even their own justice system. Their most recognisable symbol was the Cross of Burgundy on different backgrounds.

Tercios battled all across Europe with the expansion of the Habsburg house. They fought in Italy, and most famously in the Belgian region of Flanders – there are several monuments in Antwerp hailing the locals who opposed them. Velázquez painted the most famous work of art around the Tercios, La Rendición de Breda – the “Surrender of Breda”, an Italian city conquered in 1625. As world and war changed, their battlefield tactics became obsolete in the 18th century, and they eventually dissolved away, transformed into regiments, as the figure of the pikeman was dropped.

The name Tercios survives in naming the Spanish Navy and Legion units. The historical recreation association 31 Enero Tercios appeared (as far as I have been able to find) around 2020, formed by history professional and amateurs who wanted to remember the Tercios units, organising re-enactments and activities all around the country. Their website is a bit chaotic, and might be slightly problematic with its language at points, but most people just seem to enjoy dressing up, playing with fake weapons, and going home to their phones after they wrap up.

One of the goals of the association is to establish the 31st of January as Tercios Day Día de los Tercios, organising activities and re-enactments throughout the country. It sounded interesting enough so we thought we would sign up the aforementioned day trip… only for it to be cancelled a couple of days later due to general lack of participation. Since there was no forecast of rain or snow, but sun for a change, we thought we could drop by on our own.

There were two main stages for the activities in Madrid: one was Plaza de la Villa (site of the historical town hall), the other Main Square Plaza Mayor. We walked through the latter on our way to the former, and there was absolutely no indication of anything going on. When we arrived at the Plaza de la Villa, they were still setting up camp (literally), so we went to have breakfast somewhere in order to be out of the cold. We had decided to join the “theatre visit” at 11:00, which was difficult as inscriptions were chaotic.

I’m not a guided-visit person, but this was… bad. My parent, who actually likes them, concurs. The “theatre” part came from three people tagging along in period dresses and a two-minute “assassination” in the end, after walking through a number of alleyways and stopping in the most awkward and windy points to see… unrelated buildings. I was completely unable to follow the theoretical plot line of the visit and how it… was any kind of plot, really. I’m still even unclear on who or why was assassinated and their relation to the Tercios.

Sequence of a "theatre play" showing the assassination of some Medieval character, complete with swordplay

The visit ended near the Army cathedral Iglesia Catedral de las Fuerzas Armadas, so I asked my parents if they minded stopping by St Michael’s church Iglesia de San Miguel, which had been closed the previous time I had been around. We were able to snoop inside, but just a little, as they were holding mass.

Neoclassical church

We then headed back towards the Plaza de la Villa, where there was a demonstration of how the pikers would train. This is the kind of thing I like to watch, but my parents don’t, especially in the cold. After a few minutes, they wanted to move on. By the time we reached the Plaza Mayor, the event there had finished and I only managed to get a photo of the ensemble.

Re-enactment of pikers formed at attention

We then headed off to a high-end traditional grill Asador de Aranda that my parent wanted to try. I can’t say I’d recommend the place, as they broke my heart. First, the menu promised baked potatoes and the waiter brought microwaved ones. As we were sitting near the actual wood oven, I had really hoped for oven-baked potatoes. The meat was all right, maybe a bit overcooked, and finally the advertised “five-star pudding” was not-at-all stellar. In general, it felt overhyped and overpriced.

After lunch, I debated whether to stay in Madrid or head back with my parents, but the next event on the Día de los Tercios schedule was a parade at 20:00… too long to wait in the cold. Hence, I decided to just make a note in my calendar for 2027, and quietly slip out to see all the re-enactments on my own. Knowing in advance that this event exists, I can keep an eye on it and plan for down time between the different activities.

27th January 2026: The calm in-between the storms (Madrid, Spain)

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I had arranged to meet my sibling in Madrid for a late lunch when they got off work. Before that, I had a free morning that I could invest in checking out an interesting-sounding exhibition, and as it seemed that the weather was going to give us a small reprieve, I headed out on the train. Upon reaching town, I stepped out of the station and walked towards a former brewery, now turned cultural centre – Complejo Cultural El Águila.

The original brewery was established around 1900 under the commercial name “El Águila” (The Eagle), aiming to become one of the first large-scale beer producers Spain. The location was chosen due to the nearby Delicias station – then an important transportation hub, and the high quality of the water in Madrid – as apparently water is the key ingredient in the making of beer, even more important than the malt. The building was designed by Eugenio Jiménez Corera, in the Neomudejar style. It was expanded between 1915 and 1935 as El Águila managed to take over a quarter of the beer market during the 20th century. In the mid 1980s, production was moved to more modern facilities, when the brand was overtaken by Heineken. At the turn of the century, the factory buildings were repurposed into the Regional Archive, a library, and an exhibition hall.

Old brewery built in brick with an eagle mosaic as logo

It was raining when I walked in, and the security guard came towards me, looking annoyed. I said I was there for the toys exhibition and he directed me to the – very visible – signage. I thanked him even though I had seen the information. He came at me. I would have found my way on my own.

The exhibition ¡Me lo pido! Juguetes en el Madrid de nuestra infancia (I’ll ask for it for myself! Toys in our childhood’s Madrid) is a collection of classic toys, from the beginning of the 20th century to the late 1980s or early 1990s. While during the years after the Civil War toys were an absolute luxury, the 1960s saw Spanish urban society thrive. It became common amongst children to write their letters to the Three Wise Men (or the Three Magi, in Spanish the Wizard-Kings, Reyes Magos) with their gift requests – no Father Christmas then. Kids would also voice (still do) those wishes out loud using the expression ¡Me lo pido!. It’s difficult to translate it, but maybe it could be “I’ll ask for it for myself”. The “myself” is actually key, because it sets some sort of “claim” over the item somehow. It is a sort of spell that seems to ban all the other kids in the friends group from wanting it, or something. I guess that makes sense if you are five…

The Magi are actually figures in the Bible who present offerings to Infant Jesus in Jerusalem. In the Spanish folklore, each has a distinct personality and appearance – they are called Melchor, Gaspar and Baltazar. Melchor is usually characterised as Northern European with a long white beard, bringing gold to Jesus as King – he sort of resembles Santa Claus. Gaspar is supposed to be Persian and sports a gold-brown beard, he presents Baby Jesus with frankincense, symbolising his Godhood. Finally, Baltazar, the dark-skinned Magus, brings myrrh to the mortal man. For a decades, before the black population in Spain grew after the dictatorship, it was an honour for men to paint their faces black in order to portray Baltazar, who is the most popular of the Magi! Nowadays, Baltazar is usually portrayed by an actual black man.

All the items in I’ll ask for it for myself! Toys in our childhood’s Madrid belong to the private collection Colección Quiroga-Montes. They range from extremely high-end, such as the doll Mariquita Pérez and metal reproductions of vehicles, to the more popular like marbles or spinning tops. In the middle, the most famous toys throughout the century – the Meccano, Nancy, Disney stuff – and my absolute favourite, the Lego before Lego, Exin Castillos (which I still use to build castles when I am stressed out). There were also photographs, some chronicling the children outside their houses – staring at toy shop windows – some intimate, after the Magi had done their yearly job.

The whole thing was endearing and I loved every bit, especially the toys dating from my childhood. It was extremely interesting to see how toys changed from metal and wood to plastic all around. However, it was also a bit unsettling to see the rigid divide between “girl presents” and “boy presents” for so long, even more than “inside presents” and “outdoors presents” any more.

Old toys - tin train station and horse, a plastic castle and a plastic pirate ship

When I finished, I walked outside again. It had been raining hard while I was inside, but now it was cloudy but dry. I mentioned before that the brewery was near Delicias station. Today, the original station is no longer in service, but it has become the railway museum Museo del Ferrocarril, a project that was created to salvage the building. Madrid-Delicias was the first monumental station built in the city. It was however short-lived: inaugurated in 1880, it closed down less than a century later, in 1969. There is a widely-believed rumour that it was designed by Gustave Eiffel, but it was actually Émile Cachelièvre who drew the blueprints. The building was erected in iron, glass, and red and black bricks, maybe trying to echo some Neomudejar touches. During its prime, it was the terminus of trains that went to the west, including Lisbon, Portugal.

In 1984, Delicias became the Railway Museum, and it hosts a number of artefacts including whole tractors – steam, diesel and electrical – and cars, along with smaller rooms dedicated to specific pieces. The main ward, which would have made up the platforms, is occupied by real trains that have long gone out of service. The side rooms host smaller collections, either historical or thematic – such as the clock room, the infrastructure room or the model room. On the upper floors, the largest train model in the country is kept running when there are visitors to snoop around. There were many things to see that were closed off when I was in the museum for the flea market Mercado de Motores (despite no running mini-trains).

Collage of the train museum, showing old trains and models

I had planned to stay for longer, but it was cold – the gates were open and the wind came through, so in the end, I decided to go wait for my sibling at their underground stop, which would be much warmer. I was lucky enough that I skipped the two downpours of the day though, as I was inside when the heavy rain came – twice.

Once my sibling was done with work, we rode the underground towards Le Chinois. This high-end Chinese restaurant advertises itself with a different name in Chinese [梦香楼 | Mengxianglou]. It claims, in Spanish, to offer a mystic experience that transports patrons to Ancient China. In Chinese, it asserts to seek authenticity before beauty in food, using the best ingredients. Either text sounds a bit pretentious, honestly, quite on par with the decoration. Everything is wooden and there is an actual dragon model running above the dining area.

We ordered a few dishes to share. We started with some dim sum – an assortment of small one-bite dishes, aptly called “Dim Sum Assortment” [点心拼盘]: Sum Siu Mai (猪烧卖; steamed, handmade dumplings with spring onion, charsiu sauce, and quail egg), Xiao Long Bao (黑猪肉灌汤小笼包; bao stuffed with Iberian pork and chicken consommé), Ha Kao (大海水晶虾饺; Steamed dumplings stuffed with tiger prawns and dehydrated bamboo) and Jiao Zi (牛肉饺子; Chinese garlic, sautéed with fresh ginger, carrots, and chives). We also ordered some Soft Shell Crab [椒盐软壳蟹] (crispy, battered, and sautéed with salt and pepper) and Rice Noodles (干炒牛河; Stir-fried noodles with black soy-marinated beef, roasted ginger, wok-fried free-range egg, and seasonal vegetables). I think – I swear none of the noodles description matches the dish we got. For dessert, we shared an selection of chocolates and tea.

Chinese food at a restaurant with a giant wooden dragon decorating the ceiling

While the food was all right, none of it actually blew my mind. Furthermore, the experience itself did not feel up to par with the pricing, especially considering that the service was not that great. A beer slammed on the ground just next to us and splattered my coat – the staff only noticed when I cleaned it up. We ordered water, but they kept the bottle away and did not refill it as needed. We had to ask for it every time. All in all, way overpriced for “just okay” dishes, so I don’t think I will come back.

After the restaurant, I had booked a ticket at OXO Museo, the museum of video games. It features old-time games, arcade machines, and even a copy of the Atari ET video game. The game, released in 1982, was a massive failure. Urban legend had it that Atari buried all the unsold copies in the middle of the desert in New Mexico – and for once, the urban legend turned out true! A stash of games was found in Alamogordo, and a bunch of them (not only ET, also Pacman, Space Invaders…) and dug out in 2013. Around 1,300 cartridges were recovered, and one of then is exhibited in the museum.

An Atari video game cartridge and a figure of ET, along a certificate of authenticity

The museum is set up as 100% interactive – you can basically play with any video game in display – form the classics on arcade machines to the more modern Play Stations. There was even a taiko game. Decoration features sculptures and holographic displays. On the upper floor, there is a Lego and Video Games exhibition, where you can participate in creating a huge Sonic mural. It’s a pity that one can only stay in the museum for two hours at a time, there are a lot of things to do! The museum is so much “for all ages and skill levels” that even I managed to win a game or two.

Old arcade games at OXO

We made the most out of our time there, and then headed off to the train to try to head back home. There were delays, so we took forever, but eventually we made it. And again, I did not get rained on!

24th January 2026: Short visit to FITUR 2026 (Madrid, Spain)

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Madrid is the seat of the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO), so it makes sense that the city hosts a yearly International Tourism Fair – Feria Internacional del TURismo, or FITUR. For years, I had been hearing how amazing it was, and how many networking opportunities for travellers there were.

I had wanted to snoop around for as long as it came on my radar, but timing never worked out until this year. I bought a general entry ticket and hoped for decent enough weather to be able to drive to IFEMA – where I can get in 40 minutes on my car or 3 hours by public transport. I’m not even kidding. IFEMA parking lot is chaotic, and so is the nearby Parque Juan Carlos I one. However, if you’re willing to add a 10 minutes’ walk to the experience, there is another convenient lot nearby you can use, where I directly headed upon seeing how traffic was. That should’ve given me an idea of the mayhem and overcrowding I was going to find inside.

Fitur entrance, decorated with Mexican flags

FITUR takes up most of IFEMA, which makes sense considering how much money tourism makes around the world. According to the UNWTO, there were 1.52 billion international tourists around the world in 2025, and 2.2 trillion US dollars in revenue from the industry. The catchphrase of this year’s FITUR edition was “where journeys begin”, so I thought that worst case scenario, I would come back with a bunch of leaflets of cool places I wanted to visit.

Upon entering the convention centre, the first thing I found was a recreation of the new Egyptian archaeology museum in Cairo. However, the reproductions of the pieces were… bad, almost childlike. I walked into the first pavilion – Europe. There I found a lot of stands, but the catch was that very few of them held actual information about countries, most were travel agencies advertising their products. I secured some information about Sardinia, because I have wanted to go there to see the Mont’e Prama Archaeological site since I learnt about the Giants. The lady was nice enough to give me a tote bag, though I was carrying my own.

The Africa pavilion had about twenty stands of companies organising safaris, some of them even playing into the Great White Hunter stereotype! I got a few leaflets from them too. In Asia Pacific I was scolded for calling Australia an “island” and not a continent (hm, hello Oceania?) and the business pavilion was so empty it looked like a completely different fair.

Collage - Egyptian archaeological artefacts (replicas), lion sculptures in front of a safari stand, Mexico written in bold colours, and a Delorean car

Next, I headed off towards the three interconnected pavilions that made up Spain. Here I started encountering mini-parades representing different tourist resources in the country. At one point I found myself surrounded by a re-enactment of the Crucifixion (Holy Week), the ladies from Valencia’s Fallas festival and a small batallion of Napoleonic troops. Here I did find actual information stands about regions and not travel agents’, but when I had questions about specific recommendations, I was irrevocably directed to “check the website”. There were never-ending queues whenever any stand gave out anything – blocking the ways and aisles – and whenever there was anything related to food, such as samples, visitors almost came to blows. I did my best to avoid all of them.

At one point I did come across a company that prided itself in “solo travel” – they even had it in the name. Upon a slight enquire, I found out that they… charge supplementary fees to solo travellers. Like, what? However, it was the Americas pavilion that broke me in the end. I got shoved twice, almost to the ground, around the Argentina stand, only to be unable to find any information regarding Patagonia’s MEF (the reportedly most important dinosaur collection in South America, and where the Patagonian Dinosaur Exhibition originated).

Collage: racing car, a group of people dressed in white carrying olive branches, parade of drummers, and ladies wearing dresses representing different monuments of the Castilla y León area

All in all, my FITUR experience felt bizarre and extremely overcrowded. It was like paying to have the right to be bombarded by travel agency commercials. Not disappointed, but having realised that FITUR was not for me, I decided to head back to the car and drive off. I had been there for around three hours, and taken a walk around the whole fair. At first I thought I would stop for junk food, but it was too cold even for that, so I just headed home, with a bunch of leaflets and a list of websites to look at. Most of the brochures are still sitting on the shelf…

22nd January 2026: The workshop that wasn’t (Madrid, Spain)

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A while back I visited the printing museum Imprenta municipal in Madrid. I’ve since learnt that they have book-binding workshops, and I would very much like to attend one. So would at least one of my parents, and I was asked to sign them up online for one on the 22nd of January, a day when I was supposed to be at work. My project got delayed, so I ended up workshop-less and a bit envious. Just a bit. There’ll be other chances.

On the 21st, I received a notification that I could pick up some paperwork in town, so we arranged we would have lunch together after I had my documentation and they were done. We would all be taking the train, and I was a bit uneasy. I’ve complained about the railway system before, but just a few days before there had been a horrible train accident that killed over 40 people, and a slightly less horrific one that killed one person.

Though it did feel a bit uncomfortable when the train shook within the rails, we reached Madrid just a few minutes late, and I hopped off. It was extremely cold, not only because it was January, Spain had been hit with a string of storms just one after the other. After getting my documents, I realised I was rather close to the fountain I had missed when I was in the Bravo Murillo area exploring after Expogema, Fuente del Río Lozoya, which honours the river Lozoya, the source of the city’s drinking water. It was my third time trying to find the fountain and… it was getting cleaned, and thus empty and fenced off. I felt it was hilarious.

A fountain with female allegory decorations

I headed towards the underground and headed towards Tirso de Molina station. The station opened in 1921, and one of the halls retains the original tiling and decoration, the historical hall – Vestíbulo Histórico de Tirso de Molina, which is considered part of the underground museum network Museos de Metro de Madrid. The station has a bit of a black urban legend / history. It is located underneath the square Plaza de Tirso de Molina, which honours a Spanish friar, dramatist and poet. The square named after him used to be home to his own convent, a building that was expropriated and demolished during the Ecclesiastical confiscations in the 19th century. Apparently, there was a small graveyard associated to the convent, and human remains were found (and quietly reburied behind the walls) during the construction of the station. Creepy.

The historical access hall to the underground station - white with blue decorative tiles

Quite close stands the manor known as Palacio de la Duquesa de Sueca, an Age of Enlightenment building which was for a while featured in one of the most successful fictions on Spanish TV – El Ministerio del Tiempo (The Ministry of Time). It has been abandoned forever, it seems, and nobody quite knows what to do with it, so it is slowly wasting away.

Façacde of a manor with many windows and balconies

I walked to the small metropolitan museum Museo de San Isidro, which was running a special exhibition about the Temple of Debod and the town it used to stand on, fittingly called Debod. 1954-1964. Debod is the only free-standing Nubian temple outside Egypt. The building was dismantled during the International campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia between 1960 and 1980, as the rising waters from the Nile, turning into Lake Nasser, swallowed them.

The exhibition did not only focus on the temple Templo de Debod, but put a lot of emphasis on the town of Debod itself, whose people were forcibly relocated to Kom Ombo. The region of Nubia stood between today’s Egypt and Sudan. It was home to the Kerma culture from around 2500 BCE until the area was conquered and incorporated to the New Kingdom of Egypt around 1500 BCE. Kerma culture is regarded as one of the earliest civilisations of Ancient Africa. A lot of knowledge about the region, including culture and customs, was lost with the move. It was a bit heart-wrenching, surprisingly even more than hearing about it in Egypt itself. The exhibit comprised a lot photographs and videos that showed the people who left, and you could see the desperation in their eyes.

A good part of the items shown were photographs of how the temple stood and how it was documented before getting dismantled in order to rebuild it – which in the end, they did wrong, as one of the entrance pillions was placed backwards. The building was originally erected in the 2nd century BCE, dedicated to the God Amun, creator and King of the Gods. He would later be merged with Ra, hence the Amun-Ra denomination for the Sun God. The small structure would be later expanded by Kings and Roman Emperors. It reached the Nile through a processional walkway that ended at a quay.

The temple was gifted to Spain in 1970, dismantled in 2,300 pieces. The whole thing was reconstructed as well as it could be, filling up the gaps with newer material in a process called anastylosis, and experts say it’s not even a good one. Today, the Templo de Debod stands in a park in the middle of Madrid, and can be accessed at weekends. Unfortunately, the sandstone is getting weathered, which threatens the integrity of the whole structuture. What is surprising is the contrast between all the photographs in the exhibition, and the complaint that there was not enough good documentation to re-erect the building.

Numibian archaeological artefacts (a chest, a hammer, bracelets and necklaces), and a b/w photograph of a small temple next to the Nile

After the exhibition, I walked around the museum once, then went out in the cold again. At least it was sunny, and after noon, so not that bad. During a conversation about Madrid must-dos, someone had mentioned two churches I did not know, which happened to be rather close. The first one I found was the Cathedral Church of the Armed Forces Iglesia Catedral de las Fuerzas Armadas (also known as Church of the Sacrament Iglesia del Sacramento). Though Spain is technically a non-religious country, this has not always been so. For a long time it was an officially Catholic country, and there is a strong catholic tradition amongst the armed forces. As a matter of fact, there is even a Military Archbishopric of Spain (Arzobispado Castrense de España), with seat in this cathedral. I am not sure how one can be an soldier and a priest, much less a bishop / colonel, but I am not an expert.

The cathedral is a Baroque building designed by Juan Gómez de Mora, with a Neoclassical altarpiece and many frescoes. It was built between 1671 and 1744 to be the church of a convent that has since disappeared. The main façade was built by Pedro de Ribera towards the end of the construction period. Today it belongs to the Ministry of Defence – I did not know state agencies could own churches in Spain.

Inside and out of a Baroque church

Nearby stands another important church, the Pontifical Basilica of Saint Michael Basílica Pontificia de San Miguel, another Baroque structure – actually it is considered one of the most important buildings in the Spanish Baroque. It is attributed to Italian architect Giacomo Bonavia and dates from the 1730s. Unfortunately, it closed at 13:15 and it was 13:13, so I could not come in.

In front of the church there is a sculpture called The Reader El Lector, a bronze statue by Félix Hernando García. The statue was recently moved there as part of the urban sculpture program, since a library was installed there in 2011. It is apparently a homage to Carlos Cambronero y Martínez, apparently one of the first “Madrid Historians”.

I headed back towards where I had to meet with my parents, and though I was early, so were they. Their workshop, which was scheduled to finish at 14:00, wrapped up at 13:20, so in the end I had to head there in a bit of a hurry. Once I picked them up, we walked to “a random restaurant” in theory. In practice, one of them had a very specific place in mind – Museo del Jamón. Self-described as a “family chain of restaurant”, the idea of a ham-focused restaurant was born in 1978. Since then, they have opened seven different eateries specialising in ham and other pork products, alongside several typical tapas.

The Spanish word for ham is jamón. It is obtained from the hind leg of a Black Iberian pig, usually. The ideal ham-producing swine lives range-free in oak groves (the dehesa) so it can feed on acorns, as they lead to the best meat, apparently. After the animal is slaughtered, the hind legs are salted and left to dry, in a curing process that may take up to 48 months. How much acorn the pig consumes as part of its diet, and whether or not this is supplemented, determines the quality of the final product, with the best hams being “100% acorn fed” – jamón 100% ibérico de bellota, marked with a black label.

Of course, many other products might be obtained from a pig – the most important sausages are lomo, chorizo and salchichón. Lomo refers to the tenderloin, the piece of meat underneath the ribs and along the spine, cured for about four months after being marinated in spices – normally oregano, garlic and paprika. Chorizo is a sausage made from pork meat and fat with added garlic, and can be either cured or fresh (the former is eaten as is, the latter is usually cooked). The meat is seasoned with smoked paprika (pimentón), which determines how spicy it becomes, and gives it a bright red colour. The best chorizo comes in natural casings, usually the intestines of the pig, and the curing process can take several months. Salchichón is similar to cured chorizo but there are more spices added – salt, pepper (often black grains), oregano, nutmeg, and garlic – and curing can last for three months. If the animal was an acorn-fed black Iberian pig, the monicker ibérico de bellota is added to the name.

We shared a salad (Ensalada de tomate y ventresca de atún), with tomato, tuna and orange – because my parents are unable to be in a restaurant without ordering a salad. We also ordered some battered squid Calamares a la andaluza, and a dish called “Recorrido Ibérico Bellota” – with bits of the different pork cuts: jamón de Bellota 50% Ibérico, chorizo Ibérico de Bellota, salchichón Ibérico de Bellota and lomo Ibérico de Bellota. Despite Madrid being dead in the centre of Spain, battered squid is an extremely typical dish, especially in sandwich form.

Lunch - breaded squid, salad, sausages and ham

I had been extremely lucky that the rainy weather had given a reprieve and I could carry my paperwork around safely, but it was windy and not that nice. Thus, after lunch we headed back towards the train, and we were rather lucky with the connections, so we were home rather early. During the train ride, I learnt hat someone from the binding workshop had decided to leave in a huff because it was “too basic”. I could have totally taken that spot!

18th January 2026: Industrial Heritage around Entrepeñas Reservoir (Spain)

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Weather warnings, work, and a nasty stomach bug seemed to conspire against me for a lousy start of the year, and what I had originally planned for the 2nd of January had to be delayed a couple of weeks until I caught a break from everything. Eventually, the plan just became a “grab the backpack and go” when the stars aligned – and actually, I just required one star and the only thing it needed to do was shine. Whilst I’ve been around the reservoir Embalse de Entrepeñas before, I had never been aware of the not-so-hidden hiking route that departs from the parking lot, heading downstream. I found its description in a book about walking routes in the province, it was not a difficult drive, and the route could be expanded to include a couple of spots the guide did not consider.

Spain has long had a complicated relationship with freshwater. Despite being a majorly dry country, it has developed a wide net of water-intensive agricultural hubs. The cyclic droughts and low-quality soils in the centre do not help – the areas with a nice temperate climate and good soils don’t have water. Thus, once the technology was readily available (the first dams date back from the late 19th century), the first Hydrological Plan (Plan Hidrológico Nacional) was developed during the years of Franco’s Dictatorship. The government designed and built an extensive network of reservoirs in order to, well, store freshwater. Water transfers were designed to feed the eastern orchards. Of course, these were controversial on several fronts. First, the environmental one. Second, the social one – once a dam is built and the water rises, it swallows everything that had previously grown on the riverbanks, be it healthy ecosystems, entire villages, or historical buildings. And third, of course, the moral one – dictatorships are not good, so well-meaning people have to oppose anything such a system devises.

In addition, the reservoir Embalse de Entrepeñas has a bit of a bad reputation. During the 1980s it became popularised as an inland sea, along other reservoirs in the Spanish central plateau, as what became known as the Castilian Sea – El Mar de Castilla. However, despite the extensive security network decades of beach tourism had impulsed along the coast, inland water bodies were left unattended. I grew up on reports of people drowning in Entrepeñas. Everybody seemed to know someone who died there. Adult perspective says most people knew the same victim, or they were just repeating hearsay. As a kid, I really believed that the reservoir might actually been an evil entity feeding on swimmers.

The reservoir Embalse de Entrepeñas was built between 1946 and 1952, during Franco’s Dictatorship, but the plan dated back from 1902. The goal was to regulate the flow of River Tagus to keep drinking and agricultural water in storage, along with producing electricity. During the mid-1960s, the 813 square hectometres of water became a holiday spot. However, soon a “ghost” hovered over the reservoir, the dreaded Tagus-Segura Water Transfer, Trasvase Tajo-Segura. The Segura River is used to water the orchards in the east of Spain, but its flow cannot cope with the demand. Thus, water is carried from the Tagus to one of the tributaries of the Segura, in an engineering feat that was built between 1968 and 1971. The transfer established the region of Murcia as a strategic agricultural area. However, it dried up the Tagus reservoirs, killing off the water-tourism, not even mentioning the environmental consequences of the whole project.

However, as tourism dwindled, something else happened. Entrepeñas became a hotspot of conservation success when threatened griffon vultures (Gyps fulvus) started nesting in the rocky walls. Child-me was very concerned about birds of prey going extinct but had no idea about ecology, so I was halfway worried about vultures disappearing, halfway low-key worried they would make a meal out of me. Considering that during a couple of hikes I’ve actually had raptors circling me, child-me might have been onto something.

Back to the present, though. I woke up and even before pulling up the blinds, I looked at the weather app. Being January, the day was going to be cold, but the temperature would not go below zero, and the sky would be clear. To be honest, I was desperate to do basically anything, but at the same time, there was this wave of exhaustion going through me. I kicked myself into gear and got onto the car. I filled up the tank and set on my merry way towards the parking lot / viewpoint that the guidebook described as being “on the right, before the tunnel”. Dear book, there are two tunnels. You mean the second one. If you go right before the first one you end up… somewhere else. Yes, talking from experience. You can turn around in one of the parking lots on the side of the road. If you dare, of course.

I dared, else I would have had to drive an extra 9 km. I found the almost empty parking lot, parked the car, and set off onto a closed-road-turned-trail. It was around 11:00, the air was crisp and the sun was shining. When I thought in November that hiking season was over, I had not realised there are routes recommended for winter, and this is one of them, as the trees being devoid of leaves allows for a great view of the Romanesque bridge downstream.

The first part of the hike runs between the river Tagus Río Tajo and a vertical wall, eroded at trail level to form a rock shelter. The vultures were already active, treating me to some nice flights. The trail was slightly downwards, and it did not take long to catch a glimpse of the so-called Roman Bridge – actually Romanesque Puente Románico. This area of Spain tends to confuse Roman and Romanesque. The original bridge was erected in the 14th century, but it was rebuilt in the 19th, and that is the structure which remains today.

Rock shelter formed by brown rock

View from above of the valley, with the river crossed by an old bridge. The arch of the bridge and its reflection create a perfect circle

Near the bridge stands the original hydroelectrical station Central Hidroeléctrica de Guadalajara, but it was harder to see it across the river. It was not long before I reached the bridge itself, and the route said to turn right then. Instead, I crossed over and continued downstream, as I had seen that there was an abandoned train station nearby, Antigua Estación de Ferrocarril de Auñón. The original building was part of the former railway network Ferrocarril del Tajuña, a line that was originally designed to join Madrid and Aragón in order to transport people and freight, However, it was eventually dismantled since it was too expensive to maintain and yielded to too little revenue. The station was in use between 1919 and 1953. After 1946, due to the works on the reservoir, Auñón became the terminus. Today, the actual rail is gone, and there are only ruins of the passenger and warehouse buildings, and the loading docks. Unfortunately, the whole thing was covered in graffiti, and the vegetation rather overgrown.

Abandoned hydroelectrical central

Abandoned station building

I backtracked and headed upstream. It did not take long to reach the former hydrological station Central Hidroeléctrica de Guadalajara, a brick building erected in 1909. Not much further, I found the remains of the original dam over the Tagus, with a rather impressive water sprout remaining – and a makeshift bridge over the water, made with wooden logs, that I looked, photographed, and no way in hell I was going to try to step on.

Remains of the former dam

I continued upstream until I reached the modern gravity dam Presa de Buendía, a huge structure made of reinforced concrete that holds back the water. It’s a very different sensation when you look at the dam from this perspective, upwards, from the “empty” side than what I had always experienced – from the top.

Humongous river dam

I turned back towards the bridge, which I had to cross to return to the parking lot. I still had a bit of time, so I wandered towards the actual reservoir area. There’s a structure there that fascinates me… a small building with remains of a railway that goes right into the water. I have never been able to figure out what it was made for.

Tranquil river in a crisp winter morning

Rock shelter alongside a river course

Tranquil reservoir. Some stairs disappear into the water.

And that was it for the day trip, a short hike I dragged for about three hours during the one good weather day we had for a bit and that turned out to be my first outing of 2026. Afterwards, it was just a matter of hopping onto the car and heading back home, feeling recharged.