Palacio Real de Madrid
Luxor—check.
Angkor Wat—check.
Coliseum—check.
Personally, I like to search for the unexplored or, in this world where everybody travels, the under-explored. But sometimes, I just have to get out to the E-Rides. They're on everyone's list for a reason: They're spectacular. Here's an account of our box checking at the Royal Palace, official residence of King Juan Carlos.
I'm not sure what "official residence" means. The King and his family don't actually live here, so it's more an "official non-residence." Maybe it's like 220 North Zapata Highway, Laredo, TX where so many expat San Miguelenses "live."
"Am I a U. S. resident? Sure am, Podner. Ah rent a mailbox condo in the Lone Star State."
Same deal, except the King's place is nicer than ours.
Juan Carlos uses this pile of marble to greet foreign dignitaries and for various other ceremonies. Oh, yeah. And to make a buck off tourists. Costs €8 to get in the place; €9 if you want the guided tour. (Which, believe me, is well worth avoiding unless you like being herded in a docile group while some functionary spouts mind-numbing statistics.) I bet the place is a moneymaker: Thousands were there when we visited.
Unfortunately, your eight euros doesn't buy you the right to take photographs inside, an annoying policy that seems to have spread all throughout Spain. Being an actual paid guest of the palace, I felt entitled to lift three images from the Palacios Reales website (in Spanish). May I be forgiven if I have overreached my welcome.
The Throne Room
The Porcelain Room. (Where Jean remarked: "Nice clay.")
The Royal Armory.
The palace contains 2,000 other rooms. We, the Great Unwashed, were permitted to see a couple dozen of them. No touching. The rooms we saw were decorated with works by Velázquez, Caravaggio and Goya, among many others. Exquisite frescoes, tapestries and carpets were everywhere. There were individual pieces of furniture worth more than my house.
The Music Room contains five Stradivarius instruments. I wonder if they're ever played, like those in the Violin Museum in Cremona. Keeping instruments like these locked up behind glass is a crime. They were created to be played; they need to be played to stay healthy; and the world deserves to hear them played. Jean and I walked into the Music Room and I said, "Gee. They sure look nice. I wonder what they sound like?" Weird.
Outside, where I was grudgingly allowed to take pictures, we admired the ornate lamps.
Note the lack of graffiti. It can be done, folks.
To the south, the palace faces the Catedral de la Almudena. It's there so the King can get to church when his own private chapel needs cleaning.
This couple took pictures of each other standing in front of it. You can always count on tourists to put a monument in perspective.
(Once I watched as busloads of Japanese tourists visiting the Grand Canyon snapped endless photos of themselves in front of the sweeping view from Maricopa Point. Meanwhile, Chinese gamblers, taking a break from Vegas, were doing the same in front of the restrooms.)
The palace has a museum store that we checked out in case they had any Goya prints for sale. They didn't.
But they did have some extra-long floppy pencils and little spiral-bound notebooks. So you could sketch the interior of the Dining Hall. I mean, if it's allowed.
The Palacio Real de Madrid is just one of seven royal palaces. King Philip II kicked off the second home fad when he ordered this one built in 1734. It's a sort of town 'n' country home, surrounded by lots of open space.
The westward view from the palace is of a garden called Campo del Moro.
Nice view, considering it's in the middle of Madrid. Nobody's gonna build a Wal-Mart near the King's place.