The train from Porto to Madrid
was definitely an experience – it was dingy, hot, dark, cramped and almost 9 hours long. When making our reservation we opted for seats instead of a bed to save money. If we would have known the quality of the train, we would have opted for beds. Next time I guess.
Corey was literally sitting on the heater so we swapped seats but it was ridiculously hot regardless and each of us only slept for a couple of hours. At one point (probably 3:00am), both very uncomfortable and unable to sleep, we chugged the rest of the red wine we had out of the bottle and were able to sleep a little bit after that.
We arrived in Madrid at 9:00am and then spent most of the day securing our reservations on trains to get to Toulouse, France. We waited in line at the Madrid Chamartin station for about 45 minutes and then spoke with a gentleman who told us he could only get us to Barcelona but not to France. I speak a very limited amount of broken Spanish so I did my best to apologize and explain that we wanted to go to Toulouse and showed him on the RailPlanner App which trains we wanted to reserve seats on. He gave no other explanation. We left, not really sure what to do next so we walked to our hostel to drop off our big backpacks, only about a mile and a half walk.
Our best bet was to go to the train station that we would be departing from the next day – Madrid Puerta De Atocha, which is a much bigger station. We used the hostel WiFi and called an UBER to get there.
*Quick note on International phone coverage: Corey and I both have Verizon so it costs $10 per day, per phone to activate data abroad. We have been really good about only activating data on one phone in specific circumstances, like to call an AirBnB host to get into an apartment. About 90% of the time we use WIFI but have activated data once or twice a week since being abroad. We plan several days in advance and download maps offline of the cities we are visiting on Google Maps. We also do our best to communicate with our AirBnB/Hostel hosts 1-2 days in advance to set up a specific meeting time and address so we just need to show up and not worry about finding WiFi. Luckily, most train stations have complimentary WiFi that we have used in a pinch.*
Alright, back to Madrid…
The line for the International ticket line took us about 2 hours to get through. We discovered, from the lovely woman who helped us reserve our seats, that Spain and France have had a tumultuous relationship over the years. It turns out Portugal and Spain built their railways to a wide gauge of about 5’6” in the 1850s. At this same time, France had already built their tracks to a smaller gauge. You can do more research on this but it’s a pretty fascinating part of history. Also, the high speed train that we ended up taking from Madrid to Barcelona began in 2012, only 7 years ago.
So moral of the story, we got our tickets to Toulouse and I will say that we felt pretty triumphant after that whole ordeal. We were also quite loopy from such a long travel day with very little sleep and opted to drink Orange Rhinos (a drink Corey and I created back in Denver several years ago – gin with orange soda) in our hostel and then grab some food from a little kebab place across the street. We both showered after eating kebabs and took an epic nap, refreshed and ready for tapas!
Going out in Madrid for Tapas
was an incredible experience. Again, I speak basically no Spanish and Corey can only say “donde esta la biblioteca.” Coming from Portugal where would only say “obrigado,” it felt good to say anything in the native language.
I found a place that was filled with locals, definitely not a tourist spot. We walked in and ordered beers right away. The place was packed so we stood in the middle of the bar area and eventually caught a piece of counter after some other patrons left. 
The bar tenders started sending us plates of food. We were stoked because we clearly had no idea how this all worked or how to order (no menus) so having food automatically sent to us was ideal. We ordered more beers and had more food.
Eventually I went up to the bar and told the gentleman “lo siento, yo no habla Español. Quiero calamares y papas por favor.” AKA “I’m sorry, I don’t speak Spanish. I would like calamari and potatoes please.” Obviously the bartender gave me a huge smile and we received calamari and potatoes a minute later. The potatoes also came with little cocktail wieners which was a pleasant surprise.
The key to success when not knowing the language is being open to receiving whatever you order with gratitude and excitement. Nights like this are what the trip is about. Just taking it all in, absorbing the local culture and eating delicious food while also having no clue what we’re doing.
You might also ask yourself, only one night in Spain? Really? The answer is yes, only one night in Spain. Corey and I are on food tour and to be honest Spanish cuisine is not something that either one of us is overly excited about so we opted to cruise through Spain and spend more time in the South of France.