Queue up: Beetles — Revolution

Today was our first full day in Madrid. Our only planned “thing” was to go to the Reina Sofia museum to see Picasso’s Guernica.

We learned our lesson from the Book of Kells in Ireland – buy the first admission ticket of the day, and make a b-line for the thing you want to see the most. We got to the museum early and queued up in a long line before opening time. While in line, Peter pulled up a map of the museum and located Guernica, which was on the second floor, other side of the museum from where we entered. Once inside, I saw a schematic that gave us the closest stairwell to the painting on the second floor (thank goodness I was born before Google Maps and could interpret one of these things). We hustled at warp speed past everyone that was waiting for the elevator. Mark set the pace on the stairwell of 2-steps at a time, and arrived in the Guernica gallery with only a handful of people there. Later, it would be people at least 3 deep. This was Art Museum Mission Impossible style precision.

As I stood there quietly with just a handful of people around me, I was in awe. It was hard to take it all in, the size, the message, the images. It’s nothing like it is in books or online. Behind me was a series of photographs that Dora Maar took that showed the progression and changes he made while he was painting. I kept swiveling back and forth between the two. It was an incredibly moving experience.

We spent 2 delightful hours in the museum enjoying their surrealist and cubist galleries. We went through every room on the second floor. The themes of the galleries were Spain and revolution. We then tried to take the stairs to the third floor, which doesn’t seem to exist. It was like being in the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose…signs with things but staircases to nowhere.

Instead of going down, we kept going up Peter likes to lead the way on the most difficult path from A-to-B. We found out later Mark and Cat took the elevator to the fourth floor. The fourth floor had temporary exhibits, which we enjoyed as much as what was on the second floor. A side note, there is nothing like walking through a quiet museum gallery with Peter. In addition to his witty analysis, his shoes squeak…loudly. You can walk into another gallery and hear “squish, squish, squish” and know that he is coming and you don’t have to worry about getting separated.

We thought we were done, and then Mark and Cat told us about the Richard Serra exhibit/hall. We spent about 30 minutes of our total 2 hours in this one gallery. Our photos will do a better job explaining why than I can. Interesting side note, this was a duplicate sculpture made of the original. Apparently the National Museum lost a 38 ton sculpture 6 piece sculpture with two pieces as tall as me. How does something like this happen? Peter thinks someone threw it away……hmmmmmm….

After, we walked to the Retiro park to scout out our sunset location. Gate 1 was closed, gate 2 was closed, it wasn’t until the third gate that there was a sign that explained the park was closed to evaluate damage from weather. That is park number 2 that has been closed due to weather. These are huge city parks. Triple rats Batman! We went out to photograph sunset at our backup location but were thwarted again. I’ll share that tomorrow….it was epic.

So back to this afternoon. Peter navigated us to the hotel….through a super large protest with an extra large police presence. I guess it was consistent with the theme of the day – revolution.

All this effort can’t go unrewarded. Peter had made us lunch reservations at a delicious and popular restaurant. One and half hours, three courses, and two bottles of wine later, I was ready for a nap. I think I may have a little Spanish in my gene pool and I have been doing it wrong all this time. Well maybe not the 9:00 PM dinners….that might kill me. I might have to double my statin when I get home.