Palacio Real and Catedral de la Almudena

 

 

 

Madrid is quite a fascinating city to wander through - plazas connected by narrow, winding streets/alleys, areas crowded with people to those with few others around, lots of Spanish tourists looking at their maps. We toured the Palacio Real - built in the mid 1700's on the site of the 9th century fortress constructed by Mohammed I of Cordoba. While the current royal family lives in more modest lodgings in the suburbs, it is still used for ceremonial purposes.

 

 

 

 

The palace is surrounded by gardens with many statues - we heard 2 different stories about the statues in the gardens to the east - our waiter told us Queen Isabel had a dream that the statues were going to fall and kill her so ordered them to go in the garden; the guide book seems to think that the palace structurally couldn't support their weight.

 

Santa Maria La Real de la Almudena Cathedral - Directly facing the palace to the south is the cathedral named after the Patroness of Madrid. Evidently in 1085 King Alfonso VI found an image of the Virgin inside the city wall. He named this image Almudena (from the Arabic word "almudaina" that means city wall).

 

 

While the image of the Almudena Virgin dates back to the 16th century, the building of the church began in 1883 but wasn't consecrated until 1933.

 

Posted with Blogsy