Madrid Short Breaks Guide

The Capital of Spain, with 3m people, 646 metres above sea level, and founded by the Emirs in the 8th century, Madrid is now a modern cosmopolitan city and pretty fashionable at that.

The main draw for most people coming to Madrid are the world-class art palaces, but there are also numerous parks, museums, tapas bars, nightclubs and restaurants which divert your attention away from your original intentions for the city. The Old Town is pretty easy to navigate and surprisingly small, so you can walk it easily, taking in the breathtaking architecture at the same time.

Getting to Madrid
A good number of UK-based airlines fly direct to Madrid Including BA, BMI, Easyjet, and recently Vueling has started a direct route from Cardiff. You can search all of these airlines from our flight search on our cheap flights to Spain page.

Alternatively, many passengers are now taking advantage of the increasingly popular night train from Paris to Madrid called the Elipsos Trainhotel. You can book the through ticket including the Eurostar portion from Rail Europe.

The other way of making the journey part of the holiday is to try the ferry services to Spain with Brittany Ferries, especially if you live in the south-west of England. A Portsmouth to Bilbao service now takes 24 hours. An ALVIA train from Bilbao to Madrid via Valladolid and Burgos can be booked at the station or at Spanish Rail, the UK agent.

Getting Around in Madrid
If you are visiting Madrid for just a few days we strongly recommend a Madrid Card. The card gives you access to Entry to over 50 museums and tourist attractions in Madrid (including the Prado, Reina Sofía and Thyssen-Bornemisza museums, the Royal Palace and the Wax Museum). A 48 hour card costs Euro 46.55, for an extra 10 Euro, you can get unlimited public transport included.

If you just want to chill your way around the city, then don’t bother getting a card, it’s only worthwhile if you want to blitz the sights of the city in as short a time as possible.