Madrid Walking Tour: Exploring Hapsburg and the Prado Museum

Itinerary

Your Madrid Walking Tour begins from designated meeting point, where you will meet your guide who is proficient in English and Spanish. S/he will escort you throughout the tour sharing stories, anecdotes and the rich history of the Hapsburg dynasty.

Hapsburg was the name given to Madrid, when it was under the Hapsburg reign, which began with Charles I in the 16th century. It was under his patronage that Madrid witnessed a drastic surge of monuments and palaces. The period in which the Hapsburg ruled Spain is also called the Spanish Golden Age of Cultural Efflorescence. Later on, Philip II made it the capital of Spain and the city grew dramatically.

Make your way through the picturesque streets lined with important buildings, monuments and palaces built in Renaissance and Baroque architectural style. Hapsburg’s Madrid has a distinct structural design consisting of narrow, winding streets and monuments hidden behind huge walls. The construction is mostly simple in design with less focus on grandiose and is uniformly marked by brick and granite walls, huge towers in the corner of the buildings and facades with few balconies.

Learn about Madrid’s Habsburg roots as you stop at Calle Mayor where you can admire the magnificent Palacio del Duque de Uceda and Iglesia del Sacramento. You will find many more interesting buildings as you walk through Plaza Mayor and Plaza de la Ville. The beautiful Baroque fountains will give you beautiful backgrounds to take those perfect memorable photographs.

The guide will take you through other important attractions in the area like the Calle del Codo, Plaza del Conde de Miranda and the Convento de las Carboneras, before you stop at one of the renowned cafés of this locality and enjoy a free drink.

Continue your tour to the famous Museo Nacional del Prado, also known as the Prado Museum. The construction of the museum was initiated under the patronage of Charles III in 1785 to initially house the Cabinet of National History. But after its completion, the monarch’s grandson Ferdinand VII encouraged by his wife Queen María Isabel de Braganza decided to open it as the Royal Museum of Paintings and Sculpture. It opened to the public in 1819 to show Spanish art’s prowess over other European schools of art, and became home to artworks belonging to the Spanish royalty.

Prado Museum’s permanent collection is one of the largest in the world and comprises around 7,600 paintings, 1,000 sculptures, 4,800 prints and 8,200 drawings, in addition to a large number of works of art and historic documents. Some of the main highlights of the museum are Velasquez’s Las Meninas, El Greco’s Fable, Goya’s The Countess of Chinchón and Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights among others.

Inside the museum, your guide will discuss about the artworks and their creators and share interesting trivia about the museum and the artists.