Madrid (2022)
Inhalt/Content
A beautiful palace and monastery complex – NO PHOTOS!
On Thursday we made a trip to San Lorenzo de El Escorial, a rather small town northwest of Madrid. The town has several sights, including the very controversial mausoleum of Franco, which we didn’t see for that very reason. Instead, we visited the “Real Sitio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial” (in English “Royal Seat of St. Lawrence of El Escorial”). This is a palace and monastery complex, which was built by the then King Philip II of Spain from 1563 to 1584 and has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1984. We left early to take a normal bus to the village. The weather that day was a bit rainy, but knowing we would be spending a lot of the time under one roof made it less of a tragedy.
When we arrived at the palace and monastery complex, there was a negative surprise: it was forbidden to take photos in the entire complex! It turned out that this rule applied in general to many museums in Spain. We were only able to take two photos in the courtyard because we weren’t aware of the rule here and no employees had looked there. In the building itself, there was a person in practically every room who made sure that no photos were taken – which were quite a few employees, given the huge facility! So it’s a pity that we can’t show any photos here because there was really a lot to see. At least on the German and English Wikipedia articles, you can find some photos from the inside.
As already mentioned, at the beginning there were only a few inner courtyards. First, we were at a staircase that leads to a library. Apart from the old books, the wall and ceiling paintings were also very impressive. Here one has already noticed how much money the king has put into the walls of the complex. But this was far surpassed by the ceiling paintings in the church that came later. Do you know the wall and ceiling paintings of the Sistine Chapel? Even these would almost pale in comparison since a huge painting was painted in each ceiling cross between four columns – and this is about 20 meters above the floor. After that came several single rooms for the royal family, all of which were hung with huge paintings depicting stories from the Bible, like the murals and ceilings that preceded them. After a few rooms, we went underground to the royal tombs. The chapels there contained many tombs, all made of rich marble. Back in the actual palace, the last large room was the Hall of Battles. This is a hall about 50 meters long and puts everything else in the shade because it shows several wars on both long walls on which a countless number of warriors, mostly with horses, have been painted.
After spending several hours in the palace and monastery complex, we walked back to the bus station. There is a bus back to Madrid every few hours, which is why we still had some time and had a bite to eat in a café. Back in Madrid, we went to a few shops here and there and, as usual, cooked something ourselves in the evening.
