Trips · Square
Plaza del Dos de Mayo
The square Malasaña is organised around, and the clearest picture of how this city uses an evening.
MalasañaMadrid
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18 in the guide
How to spend the day
Viewpoints with a correct hour, parks that are not sights, and the walks that explain a neighbourhood faster than a museum.
Trips
Trips · Viewpoint
Templo de Debod
A second-century BC Egyptian temple, given to Spain in 1968, with the best free sunset in the city.
ArgüellesMadrid
Trips · Flea market
El Rastro
Sunday morning, a thousand stalls running downhill, and a city-wide agreement to be slow afterwards.
La Latina / EmbajadoresMadrid1/4
Trips · Park
Parque del Retiro
A former royal garden, public since 1868, and the city's shared back garden ever since.
RetiroMadrid
Trips · Riverside park
Madrid Río
A motorway buried underground and replaced with ten kilometres of park along the Manzanares.
ArganzuelaMadrid
Trips · Arts centre
Centro Cultural Conde Duque
An eighteenth-century barracks turned municipal arts centre, with a courtyard that hosts the summer programme.
Conde DuqueMadrid1/4
Trips · Neighbourhood
Chueca after work
The historic centre of queer Madrid, busy most nights, and the easiest place in the city to go out alone.
ChuecaMadrid2/4
Trips · Street
Gran Vía at night
Madrid's one piece of genuine spectacle, best at the hour the signs come on.
CentroMadrid
Trips · Park
Casa de Campo
Madrid's other park — five times the size of Central Park, and mostly scrubland and holm oaks.
Moncloa-AravacaMadrid
Trips · Viewpoint
Miradouro da Senhora do Monte
The highest of the city viewpoints, and the one worth setting an alarm for.
GraçaLisbon
Trips · Converted industrial yard
LX Factory
A nineteenth-century industrial complex under the bridge, now studios, shops and food.
AlcântaraLisbon2/4
Trips · River crossing
The Cacilhas ferry
A ten-minute commuter crossing that happens to be the best view in the city.
Cais do SodréLisbon1/4
Trips · Tram route
Tram 28
A real tram route that became a tourist attraction, with all the problems that implies.
Graça to EstrelaLisbon1/4
Trips · Walk
The Alfama lanes
The one part of Lisbon that survived the 1755 earthquake, best navigated badly.
AlfamaLisbon
Trips · Ancient building
The Pantheon
A 1,900-year-old concrete dome with a hole in the top, still the largest of its kind.
PignaRome1/4
Trips · Viewpoint walk
Passeggiata del Gianicolo
The terrace above Trastevere with the whole city laid out below it, and almost no queue.
GianicolenseRome
Trips · Park
Villa Borghese gardens
Eighty hectares of umbrella pines above the centre, with a terrace over Piazza del Popolo.
PincianoRome
Trips · Walk
The Trastevere lanes
Ivy, cobbles and ochre walls — an entirely different neighbourhood before and after dark.
TrastevereRome