Arrived in Madrid safe and sound after a rather uneventful two flights - Edmonton to Amsterdam, then Amsterdam to Madrid. We are staying at Hotel Europa which is right on the Puerta del Sol square, so very handy to things.
A bit of excitement to start our stay here in Madrid. When we checked into our room all of a sudden there was this great noise outside in the square. When we looked out on the balcony we could see all of these yellow-tshirt clad people chanting and shouting and banging on all manner of noise-making devices. When we ventured out it turned out to be a protest gathering by striking teachers, who were protesting poor wages, lack of funding and terrible classroom conditions! Whoa! Déja vu! I used my Google translate to explain that I was a teacher from Canada and we had just been through this same scenario a few months ago. I wished them luck! Hope their situation has a better ending than ours! Got a lot of Gracias and thumbs up!
After that, we sauntered over toward Plaza Major to suss out a place to grab some supper. Lots of options, but a little place that specializes in paella caught our fancy, so that’s where we ended up. I had a chicken paella and Irv had the seafood one, washed down with a couple of glasses of Alberiño wine. Then a stop for ice cream on the way back and thus ended our first día en España!