Madrid’s location in the centre of the Iberian Peninsula and high on the Castillian explains the extremes of climate it experiences, with steaming hot summers, cold winters and much more moderate spring and autumns.

Home to 3 million people, this is Europe’s highest capital city and the countries centre of government, business and home to Spain’s royal household.

Madrid has managed to preserve the look and feel of its historic areas, making the neighborhoods really worth a visit. Notable landmarks include the Royal Palace of Madrid, the Teatro Real (Royal Theater), and the city center's Buen Retiro park, which was first established in the early 1600s as private gardens for royalty.

Madrid is a fascinating combination of the grand and brassy, yet on a human, sometimes intimate, scale. Take the Gran Via, a very busy avenue. This is Broadway or State Street, circa 1951. That is, you have these great art deco and beaux-arts buildings and streets teeming with human and auto traffic. It is a thriving urban metropolis without the glassy impersonal hi-rises. You have lots of cinema and theater to choose from.

 

Just a few blocks from the Gran Via, you are in “Old Madrid.” Narrow streets, with old buildings and old-fashioned shops selling anything from military costumes to religious articles seem to catapult you into an era three centuries back.

The metro is a quick and inexpensive way to get around. And taxis are handy. But by all means walk! Wander. The city is also a walker's paradise. Its main east-west street is the early 20th century Gran Vía, running from the Prado area to the modern Plaza de España. Roughly parallel, the c. Mayor leads through the city's medieval heart, from the Puerta del Sol, Spain's "kilometer zero" from which all of the country's destinations are measured, past charming Plaza Mayor, Madrid's prettiest square, to c. de Bailén, near the Royal Palace.

 

The Plaza Mayor dates from the 1600s and was once the scene of royal pageantry. Today, there is a real “meat market” here to say nothing of dozens of tapas places, cafes, and assorted distractions from the 21st century. If you are in need of a “royalty fix,” visit the Palacio Real, which is a European palace almost on a par with Versailles and Windsor Castle: royal banquet halls, throne room, and even a royal smoking room.

Gay Madrid features a number of lively, well-defined quarters -- and you'll want to find time to visit all of them. The old cafés at the bustling center attract residents of all ages and situations. In recent years, the Chueca quarter has become the capital's fashionable gay neighborhood or “barrio”. The Chueca is a pulsating neighborhood festooned with rainbow flags and filled with bars, clubs, and stores.

In the centre of the Chueca area, you’ll find the Plaza Chueca. There are plenty of bars and clubs in this area that cater to gay Madrid. Chueca is by no means exclusive to the gay community, and you’ll also find lots of people from other walks of life enjoying the ambiance of the area. The style in Chueca is cool, alternative and bohemian and the people are open-minded. No one bats an eye if you are straight and you walk into a ‘gay bar’.

There are bars and clubs that cater for both gay men and gay women. Also, a great theme of a few bars in Chueca is that you’ll find they are ‘Chill Out’ bars. The two main streets through Chueca are Calle Horteleza and Fuencarral. Both these streets run parallel to each other, up from Gran Via, making them easy to find, and contain gay bars that are easily recognisable from the gay flag that hangs outside.

The first stop on any gay traveler's shopping list is Librería Berkana (Calle Hortaleza, 64; +34-91-532-1393; www.libreriaberkana.com), the well-stocked and modern gay bookstore at the top of Plaza Chueca. The friendly and knowledgeable staff will tell you all you need to know about Madrid's gay life, and the selection of books (many in English), cards, and assorted ephemera is quite impressive. Another popular bookstore in the area is A Different Life (CallePelayo, 30; +33-91-532-9652; www.lifegay.com), a two-level bookstore with an annex down the street. The friendly owners will point you in the right direction. Be sure to pick up a gay map of the city, such as MENsual, and a copy of ShangayExpress to get in touch with the latest in the social scene.

To the west, poets and musicians frequent the "underground" bars, while the gilded youth of Brazil and more than a few straying Chueca denizens pulse to the beat in the charmingly rehabilitated Malasaña quarter

 

First things first! Madrileños love to party. If New York is the city that doesn’t sleep, then Madrid is most certainly the European equivalent - except maybe for a leisurely disco nap in the afternoon that is! Considering the blazing hot late spring and summer afternoons you would also be well advised to join the Madrileños in seeking a cool place to pass the heat of the day with a little siesta.

The siesta is not just recommended here, it’s essential in a city whose desire for nightlife is relentless and doesn’t even begin until midnight. Nearly 2,000 bars and restaurants create outside terraces in the spring and summer where locals vie for space and the welcome cool night air. Passing the evenings until the early hours is a national past-time, discussing the day’s events over a cool beer and some tapas and watching the world go by.

This is one of Europe's most loved capitals, the third largest city in the European Union, and a welcome respite for gay travelers due to the staggering quantity and diversity of gay nightlife. The countless bars, disco bars (with a dance floor, but which don't charge on the door) and discos in Madrid open, close and change names with alarming frequency. At weekends the scene can still last the full 48 hours, depending on your stamina. Madrileños love to tour the bars and discos, so you might find yourself in a place that's semi-empty one moment, and packed to the gills the next

The city is fast becoming one of Europe’s coolest capitals with a distinctive atmosphere that is truly infectious. Together with a boundless energy, an unparalleled artistic inheritance, vibrant culture and some of the most exhilarating nightlife in Europe, Madrid has now emerged as a cosmopolitan and vivacious capital city in its own right on a par with London, Paris or Berlin.

Madrid is a contrasting city of historic sites by day and a thriving, hedonistic venue by night. Don’t be surprised to find yourself in a traffic jam at 4am in the morning!
From the time you touch ground at the airport, Madrid feels like one big party - a party with an artist's soul. Perhaps nowhere else in the world will you find such a spirited harmony of contrasts. Grandeur and romanticism stroll hand in hand down winding 16th-cenutury streets. Beautiful parks nestle up to modern glass skyscrapers, and the River Manzanares flows through the heart of everything with a seductive, lazy arrogance.

A glass of local wine and a “Salud” to Madrid makes for a great tribute to both this incandescent city and the sublime Ava Gardner.