Day 1 — The Prado & Retiro Park
Start at the Museo del Prado, one of the greatest art museums on earth. Velázquez's *Las Meninas*, Goya's Black Paintings, El Greco, Titian, and Bosch's *Garden of Earthly Delights* fill room after room — allow a full morning and pick a handful of rooms to see properly rather than rushing everything.
In the afternoon, walk into Retiro Park behind the museum. Rent a rowing boat on the lake, see the Crystal Palace, and watch the buskers and chess players near the monument to Alfonso XII. Evening: dinner in Salamanca, the elegant barrio just east of the park.
Day 2 — Reina Sofía, Thyssen & the Historic Centre
Morning: Museo Reina Sofía for Picasso's *Guernica* — the room is one of the most affecting spaces in European museum-going — plus major works by Dalí, Miró, and the Spanish avant-garde.
Late morning: Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, the third point of the Golden Triangle, with 700 years of Western painting in a more manageable format than the Prado.
Afternoon: walk to the Royal Palace, the largest in Western Europe by floor area, then Plaza Mayor and Mercado de San Miguel for an early evening vermouth and pintxos. Finish with dinner in Chueca — vibrant, welcoming, and full of good restaurants.
Day 3 — La Latina, the Rastro & a Tapas Crawl
La Latina is Madrid's tapas heartland, and this day is built around it. If it falls on a Sunday, start at the Rastro flea market, which fills the neighbourhood's streets from morning. Any day, walk the medieval lanes around Cava Baja and Cava Alta.
Sunday-style vermouth (red, sweet, on ice, with an olive) at an old-school bar is the traditional late-morning ritual, followed by a menú del día lunch — €10–12 for starter, main, dessert, and a drink.
Afternoon: walk south into Lavapiés for its multicultural food scene and alternative art spaces, then back to La Latina after dark for a proper tapas crawl — Bodegas Ricla, El Viajero, and Taberna Txakolina among the reliable stops.
Day 4 — Gran Vía, Malasaña & Chueca
Morning: Puerta del Sol, the symbolic centre of Spain, then walk Gran Vía toward Plaza de España — Madrid's grand, theatrical, neon-lit boulevard, lined with early 20th-century buildings.
Afternoon: Malasaña, the neighbourhood that led Madrid's 1980s cultural revival (the movida madrileña). Independent cafés, vintage shops, and a genuinely local street life fill its grid of narrow streets.
Evening: churros con chocolate at Chocolatería San Ginés (serving the same recipe since 1894), then dinner and drinks in Chueca — one of the liveliest, most welcoming neighbourhoods in the city, especially after 10pm when Madrid's dinner hour actually begins.
Day 5 — Toledo Day Trip
Toledo is 30 minutes from Madrid's Atocha station by high-speed AVE train, and it's one of the best day trips in Spain. The walled hilltop city was home to Christians, Muslims, and Jews living side by side for centuries, and the layered history shows in its architecture at every turn.
Visit the Gothic Cathedral, one of the great cathedrals of Spain, then the Museo del Greco, dedicated to the painter who made Toledo his home and painted it repeatedly. Wander the medieval streets — Toledo's old town is compact enough to cover on foot in a day, with steep lanes, swordsmith workshops (a local specialty since medieval times), and views over the Tagus gorge from the Alcántara Bridge.
Return to Madrid by early evening train for a final dinner back in the capital.