Published on Nov, 2024

This tour starts in Barcelona at the Sants train station early in the morning. You will be sent tickets the day before and have to find your train and check into security @30 minutes before departure. The high speed train ride is smooth...and we reached speeds up to 300 km per hour. At the Madrid Atocha Station, our guide Natalia met us at the train station. Our train was a tad bit late, and came in a different track than expected, but we eventually found Natalia. We walked over to the Prado Museum, less than a mile away. It was raining, and Madrid is not really made for lots of rain, so drainage was slow. So if there is rain in the forecast,bring an umbrella and waterproof shoes. The museum is quite large, so we focused on paintings going back centuries - Spanish painters like Goya. Natalia explained the life of the artists, as well as the possible meanings of the paintings. We stayed at the Prado for an hour to two hours. We then took left and walked through the city center of Madrid for a few hours, stopping at some of the governmental sites, historic restaurants, historic shops, and city architecture and sites. Natalia explained the significance of these sites and how they played into the success of Madrid over the years. We ended at a city marketplace and bid Natalia farewell. We had about 2 -3 hours to walk back to the Atocha Train Station, which allowed us time to eat, take photos, or buy interesting souvenirs along the way. Our tickets for the train were for the early evening. We boarded the train and spent the last 2.5 hours of the tour speeding back to Barcelona at 300 km per hour. Overall, we enjoyed this tour immensely. We got to ride a high speed train, see the antiquities of Spain as explained by Natalia, either in art or architecture, spend time exploring on our own, and sampling Spanish cuisine.

Published on Oct, 2024

Me and my family enjoyed Natalia’s wonderful tour guide today (Oct 7, 2024). She was courteous and also very knowledgeable in, for example, the background and stories behind all the great art works/paintings shown at the museum. Definitely, I gave her a 5-star, I recommend her and also the tour - if you like arts. BTW: With Natalia’s help, I was glad that there was no disconnect for my family to reach the meeting place, given that we have never been to Spain, never took the fast train or anything in Spain, don’t know any Spanish, and the tour was just on the 2nd day after our arrival to Spain. Thanks so much to Natalia.

Published on Oct, 2024

Had a great time with Natalia and our group. We went to the museum and Natalia was really knowledgeable about the artwork and the history of each painting and of course the artist. We learned details of the artwork and artist and the history that was happening at the time. After that we took s walking tour to Madrid which we saw important places of Madrid including the royal palace. Overall great experience definitely recommend.

Published on Sep, 2024

Train to and from Barcelona to Madrid was easy and fast. Laura was great. The tour of the Prado Muesum was quick and we could have stayed there all day. One guest was on a cane so the walking was a lot. We were provide a wheel chair in the museum. Laura did a good job taking us to city center in a taxi and and leading us to a great local restaurant. A map of the sites that one could see in the city center by shared pdf or print would be helpful. Thank you.

Published on Jun, 2024

Our Guide was Christina and she was very amazing. She was knowledgeable about Madrid and the history of the city. Christina took lots of photos of us and showed us all the locations we were interested in. She made sure that everyone was engaged and understood the information she was telling us. Warning: as this tour is a day trip in Madrid, you will need to wake up extra early to catch the 7:00 am train and you’ll be walking for 2 hours around the city from the moment you hop off the train, not including the 2 hours of free time you get. I did 6,000+ steps by 12:00 pm and 11,000 steps by 2 pm. However, I would really recommend coming to Madrid & taking this tour with Christina.