Madrid layover for crew: the barrio to eat in, the Sunday market, the museum that is free at the right hour and the crew hotel routine
-
#1 Aeroméxico, three years of Madrid layovers, 48 hours most of the time, and I know the city better than my own neighbourhood in Mexico City. Here is the crew version of Madrid, because the layover threads have Cape Town and Bangkok and not the European capital that half the world's long haul crews visit.
Arrival
Most long haul arrives in the morning. The crew hotel is usually central or on the metro. The rule: a two hour nap maximum, then out. Madrid at 3pm on a weekday is lunch, and Madrid lunch is the meal of the day.
Where to eat
La Latina for the tapas crawl on a Sunday after the Rastro market, Cava Baja street specifically. Lavapiés for the cheap and multicultural and the best Indian food in Spain. Malasaña for the brunch and the young crowd. Chamberí for the neighbourhood restaurants where the locals eat and the menú del día is the best value in the city: three courses, bread, wine, coffee, at lunchtime, for the price of a sandwich at the airport. The crew who eat the menú del día at 2pm and skip dinner are the ones who save the per diem.
The Sunday market
El Rastro, Sunday morning, La Latina. A flea market that takes over the neighbourhood. Go early, do not buy the first thing, and end at a bar on Cava Baja by 1pm. The whole crew does this at least once.
The museums
The Prado is free in the last two hours of every day. The Reina Sofía (the Guernica) is free in the evenings on certain days. Check the hours, queue fifteen minutes before, and see the two most important paintings in Spain for nothing. Crew do this on the second day when the legs need a slow afternoon.
The walk
Retiro park in the afternoon, the lake, the Crystal Palace, out through the Puerta de Alcalá and down Gran Vía at dusk when the lights come on. Two hours, flat, and you have seen the centre.
The traps
The bars on the Plaza Mayor (pretty, expensive, bad). Eating dinner at 7pm (nothing is open; Madrid eats at 9:30). The metro at 5pm on a weekday (packed). And the second night out, which every crew does once and regrets on the flight home.
The routine that works
Day one: nap, lunch in Chamberí, Retiro, early night. Day two: Rastro if Sunday or the Prado if not, the tapas crawl, hotel by 10, sleep, fly. Forty eight hours, twice a month, and I have never been bored of it.
Iberia and the Madrid based crews: add what I have missed. The visiting crews will thank you.
-
#2 Iberia, from Madrid, and this is better than most guidebooks. I would add the Mercado de San Fernando in Lavapiés for a cheap lunch on a weekday and the roof of the Círculo de Bellas Artes for the sunset drink that is worth the entry fee. The 7pm dinner trap is real and every foreign crew falls into it.
-
#3 Madrid based, and the menú del día tip is the crew secret. Two in the afternoon, three courses, wine included, and the whole day's per diem intact. The Chamberí ones are the best.
-
#4 Virgin does not go to Madrid and now I am jealous. Filing this for the staff travel weekend.
-
#5 @rosaflores the Círculo roof is the addition I forgot and it is the best sunset in the city. Adding it to the crew group tonight.