Museums Galore!!

Today we decided to visit two of the most popular and major art museums in Madrid; "Museo Nacional Reina Sofia", and "Museo del Prado". We started off early with "Reina Sofia", since I was very interested in seeing the painting "Guernica", by Pablo Picasso. This museum has a vast collection of art, but specializes more in modern, or contemporary art. Many of Salvador Dali's paintings and Picasso's can be found here. On the outer facade, a classical style of architecture is used, but has two very modern elevators protruding from the side, completely differing from the main building. "Guernica" gave me an eerie, yet impacted feeling. The evident presence of pain and suffering from all the figures in the painting gives you a feeling of hopelessness. After the museum, which was very interesting, we stopped for lunch at a local eatery on our way to get acquainted with the "Atocha" train station. This station is huge!! It's where all the major trains depart to various satellite towns and areas surrounding Madrid. In the afternoon we visited the "Prado", an art museum so reknown around the world it shares its popularity with other galleries like the "Louvre" and the "Guggenheim". It specializes more in Classical and Renaissance paintings. This museum has a collection of paintings by traditional Spanish painters, such as "Velazquez" and "Francisco Goya". Many masterpieces such as "Las Meninas", by "Velazquez", and "The Naked Maja", by "Goya", reside in this great gallery. Stopped by the closing of the museum, we ate at a nearby restaurant, and ventured on to our last stop, the "Puerta de Alcala". We took some photos of this great monument, and went back to the hotel.