On the route: Sierra de Guadarrama

Spain is a big country with a lot of areas quite different from each other due their geography and weather. When it´s summer in Spain you can find temperatures as 50 C. degrees in places like Seville. Some times when you are in a place with a beach or a lake, you can live with that, but in places like Madrid, 30 C. degrees could make you to despair. That far, for so many years and till no more than 8 years, almost all the companies closed in August (the month with the highest temperatures), so all the workers should have vacations in August. I can remember my first August in Madrid, the streets completely deserts.

With the time, maybe because the prices of hotels, tours, flights, etc. were so high in August (as far as it was the only one month where most of the families in most of the Spanish Communities can go on vacations), maybe because when a company has an international market they can´t just close for a whole month (in Spain workers have 22 working days as vacations), or who knows exactly why! :D more companies are working on August, but anyway an important quantity of people go out of Madrid in summer time. This year it was remarkable from July 15th. to August 15th.

In my case, I prefer to stay in Madrid in August. First of all, due the prices, they are still higher during August, but also due the quantity of people at tourist places during that period. I love to swim in water, not in people! ;) Or to feel that I can talk with my family taking the sun at the beach without 20 other people around me hearing what I´m saying… or to hear the music I would like to hear instead of the mix of 6 different styles of the people around me (that are that close due at the beach you have no space, that it feels like if all of them are actually going with you!). And I prefer not to start to talk about what you can find at the sand, due this blog is for talking about nice experiences!!! ;P

But also I love to stay in Madrid in August due how easy is to go wherever you want, with fluid traffic, with no noise at the streets, finding place where to seat in rush hours at the subway, with space enough to watch what you want at the shops, finding places to seat at the restaurants, almost no lines at cinemas, with almost no lines for going inside a discotheque… uuuuuuuuuuufffffffffff!!! It´s marvelous to enjoy Madrid this way! :))

On the other hand, if you want to go to Madrid´s surroundings, also is the best time to do it! Fluid traffic (and people not driving as fast as usual), enough places where to eat, relaxed routes on foot… lovely! :)

So, as far as routes around Madrid are something that you can easily find in internet or at travel agencies, this time let me present you my alternative route at la Sierra de Guadarrama.

Let´s start at Rascafría. It takes like an hour and a half to get there in car, in case you haven´t stop in some of the towns you find before, like San Agustín del Guadalix, el Molar, Lozoyuela or Lozoya, that are nice.



I had the good luck to found a Handcraft Fair in Lozoya, here some pics:



I recommend in special way Rascafría for eating. It has a lot of restaurants and cafeterias, one of my favorites is “El Candil” but I´m afraid it´s not exactly a cheap one. Here some pics of Rascafría and El Candil:






I also recommend visiting the Monastery of Santa María del Paular that had been transformed into a great Sheraton hotel, here some views:



To drive at Puerto de Navacerrada is also a nice experience.







You also can find there good resting spaces for drivers where you can walk a bit and I really recommend you to drink water at their fountains, it´s the same one you can buy in bottles but fresher! ;P

I would suggest you, after enjoying that area, to finish your day tour at “Los Frutales” in Cercedilla. It has great gardens where to walk a bit, you can dine inside the restaurant or at the terraces under the trees.





Enjoy the summer!!! :D