Hola! Madrid, Spain's capital city - population of around 6 million, the 22nd most expensive city in the world. Famous for Reale Madrid football team, tapa's, sangria, and home of the flamenco - and where I happened to be this weekend just been. Look at me writing my blog a few days after i got back, not 2 months after, things are looking up.

Amongst the excitement of travelling to this beautiful city we did not think through the time when booking our flights, having to rise at an unhealthy 3am in the morning to make it to Gatwick airport in time to catch our flight. Kayleigh a fellow kiwi (Aucklander I might add but we wont hold that against her), Brad an Aussie from WA (whos favourite word is "sangaaa" in normal peoples language "sandwich") and I thought we were home and hosed being at the airport with about an hour to spare, made our way to Gate 2 as stated on our boarding pass only to discover this flight was not bound for Madrid but for Laos, amidst the confusion and stress created by the ticket officer (who suffered a bad case of retardation) told us we missed our flight, then retracted and told us our new gate number. We sprung into action sprinting through the various gates and terminals to reach our gate in time - just putting this out there that this is the most exercise that I have partaken in in quite some time, other than building my drinking arm muscle.

Reached Madrid and it was a treat to the eyes seeing vibrant bright blue sky and feeling the warmth of big yellow, an attraction London has been lacking in recent weeks. Got to the hostel Las Musas Residence and settled in, that night we went on a Tapa's tour with 4 other hostels around the city, getting tapas and a free drink at every stop, after which went on a pub crawl where each welcoming shot was tequilla - tequilla and I are enemys to the death which is what I blame for the outcome of this night. Accidentally lost everybody on the pub crawl tour after the first club, so had to improvise by making friends with some crazy Austrian's one of whom was wearing an allblacks jersey (heart) there english was pretty good and even learnt some german, which lead to copious amounts of yagi shots being downed. Luckily Kayleigh found me as I was in good (or very bad whichever you may think) form and needed to hit the sack - we got lost as all the streets look the same and stumbled around - although we are way better navigators than we thought as when we finally found a taxi we were only 3 blocks away from home and only cost 3 euro.

I'm not going to talk about the next day as it involved me and the toilet once again becoming very good friends.

Saw the sights and sounds of the spanish culture, including visiting an underground flamenco bar that our new friend John (the events guy that worked in the hostel) created himself. It consisted of a small intimate room and a stage filled with dim mood lighting and lamps, 2 spanish gutairists, one singer, and one flamenco dancer it was amazing the whole crowd sat entranced by the mixture of sights, sounds and stories.

After it finished the pub crawl was set to take off, Kayleigh and I got talking to one of the pub crawl guides and ended up getting on the Metro to a locals bar where him and all the locals go every Sunday to hear to the most extraordinary girl sing, she was brazillian and sung a majority of her songs in english and a few in spanish. I hope she makes it one day so I can say I saw her live in a little bar in the middle of Madrid. It was good doing something with the locals and not thrust into the tourist rollercoaster. Another pub crawl guide Antonio escorted us back to the hostel and just as we reached the door a man come sprinting around the corner followed by a woman screaming in Spanish - turns out he had stolen her bag, Antonio chased after them and we didnt see him the next day so not sure what the outcome of that incident was.. overall was an interesting trip with lots of laughs shared.

I will definetly be returning to Spain in the not so distant future to soak up the magnificent weather and unique culture. Upon return my goal is to learn Spanish.. stay tuned on that wee endeavour! Caio for now x