Retiro Park Again and Again

Our time in Madrid was coming to an end.  We wanted to enjoy Retiro Park as much as possible.  So after breakfast and listening to an audio book--which was our daily routine--we packed a lunch of ham and cheese sandwiches,Glenn's workbook and a reading book for me.  Then Glenn got his scooter and we made our way to Retiro Park.  We first fed the pigeons and other birds. 

Then we found cool plants and more playgrounds.

Then one of Paul's coworkers and his girlfriend arrived in Spain.  She wanted to see the Prado museum, so we walked her to it.  This was a beautiful church building right next to the museum.  

Then we went to Retiro park and played at one of the playgrounds.  They have several throughout the park and it was fun going to a different one.

I loved all the different trees in the park.  

I even loved the shadows of the leaves!

While we were at this playground there were a couple kids that Glenn tried to play with.  Once they realized he didn't speak Spanish, they didn't really want to play with him.  I felt sorry for him but then there was another kid that heard us speaking English.  All of a sudden he was surrounded by lots of kids, wanting to hear him speak and wanting to speak English with him.  They were from a small town near Burgos.  Their teacher taught them English but they rarely had the chance to speak it with anyone other than each other.  So when they saw us they wanted to speak with us as much as possible.  We had a fun time with them.  They were so nice and friendly.  It was a great way to end our time in Spain.  We got a few pictures with them to remember.

As they were leaving, they all wanted to shake Glenn's hand and give him a high-five.  Glenn was like a little celebrity!

After playing, Glenn and I went back to the west entrance.  They have a lot of interesting trees and Glenn wanted his picture with all of them.

Our last week we met again at Retiro park, this time with Maria and her two girls.  We met Maria at the Easter picnic and became good friends.  

The girls wanted to go to the "Frozen" castle.  They thought the crystal palace looked like the ice castle from Frozen.  

Inside they had an exhibit of different fabrics.

The kids had so much fun gathering pine cones.  They did this for a long time.

Then they threw them all in the water.

Isn't it so beautiful!

I love the beautiful buildings we passed on our walk to and from the park.  Sometimes I would focus so much on walking and the dirty streets that I would forget to look up.  Europe certainly has beautiful buildings and it was amazing for us to walk around and see them at every corner.