2_IceCreamTime

2_IceCreamTime, originally uploaded by travis_prowell.

Yesterday was a long day. We woke up and had breakfast in our hotel, which was composed primarily of bread (and a plum for everyone as their fruit for the meal!). After breakfast we went out to explore around our hotel in Madrid. We found a plaza, got a round of Coca-Cola's and waited horribly long for our check to arrive. After baking in the sun for a while, we headed back home for our siesta, or resting time.
We got some "bocadilla de jamons," which is basically a ham sandwich, but in our case it was a pound of solid ham wrapped in two blocks of bread. It was nearly impossible to eat and so we only ate half each.
After our rest, we all left the hotel once more to go to the Thyssen, but it was far away so we needed to take Metro (much more complicated than BART, in my opinion). We had some ice cream and tried to enter the Thyssen, but we were too late and we just explored the park instead.
At the park we had water, found some Dr. Seuss-looking trees, and found a playground that revolved entirely around spinning so much that you puked. More than 70% of the playground spun in circles, and we had a lot of fun.
We took Metro back and took a long time finding a place to eat dinner (by the end, everyone was cranky, tired, and complaining about how hungry they were, me included). We ended up finding an awesome eatery, filled with croquetas, potatoes, shrimp, bread, mussels, and asparagus. After dinner we all got ice cream; I had to share Dad's after accidentally ordering alchoholic chocolate ice cream.
We got back to the hotel exhausted and settled down in our own seperate ways. Ann read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, my Dad read a book on Texas Hold-Em, I read More Than Human, Parker listened to an iPod, and Jackson played Lego Star Wars on his Gameboy. Overall, the day was tiring, but rewarding with good food, memories, and increased appreciation of relaxation.

A few more photos from yesterday: http://tinyurl.com/3akuu9