Biking in Madrid

Biking in Madrid

Today, we rented bikes to explore some of Madrid’s green spaces. Madrid is a brilliantly laid-out city. The central hub is densely populated with vertical housing, and many of the streets are narrow, which naturally keeps traffic slower. On weekend nights, many streets are even closed to cars altogether, creating kilometers of winding, gloriously pedestrian-only space.

Surrounding the heart of the city are several notable green spaces. To the east is El Retiro Park, with a large lake and manicured gardens at its center and more natural, wooded paths toward the south. The Royal Palace of Madrid sits to the west of downtown, framed by carefully designed gardens like the Sabatini Gardens and Campo del Moro. Farther west is Casa de Campo, which was once royal hunting grounds and is now a sprawling, semi-wild park with kilometers of biking and hiking trails. There’s also a forested green belt wrapping around the northwest part of the city, giving Madrid an impressive balance of urban life and nature.

We rented bikes near the museum district and spent an hour riding around Retiro Park. The park was packed with people, locals and tourists alike, enjoying the sunshine. Near the lake (the Estanque Grande, which dates back to the 17th century and was once used for royal boating spectacles), a trio of musicians played music so good we initially thought it was being piped in from speakers somewhere.

After exploring the park, we headed west, passing behind the palace to ride along the Manzanares River. Riding through the streets of Madrid was a little more harried than we expected—many roads didn’t have dedicated bike lanes, so we were sharing space with cars. We were also slightly deceived by the elevation change between the main part of the city and the river. Madrid sits on a plateau, so getting down (and back up!) is no joke.

Once along the river, we picked up the Madrid Río path, which is a beautifully redesigned green corridor built over what used to be a major highway. It’s one of the city’s best urban renewal projects, with bike paths, playgrounds, and bridges designed by notable architects.

We followed the river into Casa de Campo. The park is massive… we barely scratched the surface. (For perspective, it’s over five times the size of Central Park in New York.) We discovered there’s a dedicated bike trail that loops around much of the park, and in retrospect, or maybe for a future visit, just riding within Casa de Campo might have been a more relaxing experience. I wish we’d had more time there. Fun fact: because it used to be reserved exclusively for royalty, the park remained largely untouched for centuries, which is why it feels much more rugged and wild compared to Madrid’s more manicured spaces.

After an uphill ride back into town (okay, I may have walked my bike up a few blocks… ), we returned to our hotel for a little rest before heading out for date night.

Grant had planned a surprise, and it was brilliant—we went to see Los Misérables musical! He got us seats in the fourth row. The theater felt more like a Broadway-style house, intimate and narrow rather than massive, and our view of the performers was incredible. They used the newer staging that debuted in recent years (we’d only seen it once before at Segerstrom).

The entire production was in Spanish, but we know the show well enough that it was easy to follow. One interesting detail: Jean Valjean’s prisoner number was changed from 24601 to 23632 so that each digit could be pronounced with a single syllable in Spanish, keeping the musical phrasing intact. It was a phenomenal show.

Afterward, we went to a restaurant that felt very Alice in Wonderland—without explicitly saying so. The dishes arrived on whimsical plates with playful presentations. We ordered tapas-style and had fun trying a variety of flavors, ending the night on a perfectly magical note.