MONDAY 11th JUNE 2012

IN MADRID

After a good nights sleep we had a lovely breakfast and then a local guide took us on a city sights tour, where we saw all the major buildings and parks, all reinforcing our positive thoughts of Madrid!
There was an optional tour to the ancient city of Toledo in the arvo but we decided to give it a miss and have a lazy one! The girls wanted a haircut so we found a salon just up the road that had someone who spoke English and they booked us all in for 2pm!
That gave us time to Skype home and tidy up our cases before returning for the haircuts!
Turned to be quite a funny experience! Den and I waited while the girls had the colours brushed on, thinking that this was really "secret women's business" as neither of us had ever our wives with hair standing on end and war paint all over!!!! An attempt at a sly photo met with threats of castration and much worse!!!! At least now I now know what Sue does when she "gets her hair done" every few weeks!
After a bit of translating I went first and had mine cut - very nicely too - and then another woman got Den settled and brought out the electric clippers! Poor Den nearly freaked out, but some very rapid translation had the clippers put away and the scissors brought out!
Den and I left the girls to get sorted, and returned to our rooms to have a nap and for me to catch up on blog posting!
Our evening excursion was to a local restaurant, a very old place with a sloping floor, where we had a pretty good meal (finishing with bombe alaska) and lots of drinks! We had a table of eight with our new Victorian friends and had an absolute ball! So much fun and laughing that our sides were aching! A trio of local musicians came in and serenaded us - they were very good but when they asked for some requests Den asked if they could sing the West Coast Eagles song - they couldn't so we sang it for them!!!
It was a great night and so good to experience local fare without having to try and order it ourselves! Spanish is quite hard to pick up and the basic words are difficult to remember!