Michael Portillo's Long Weekends S01E01 - Madrid

In this first episode, Michael visits one of his favourite European cities, the vibrant and bustling Spanish capital, Madrid.

A short flight from the UK, renowned as a city that never sleeps, Madrid is somewhere Michael knows well having visited it regularly for over 60 years. And this weekend will be one to remember, with spies in hotel bars, delicate suckling pig and exquisite charcoal grilled seafood, and an outrageous bespoke Spanish cape. There's even his boyhood home in the heart of the city.

Michael's weekend begins in the city centre on the busy Gran Via boulevard, which connects the city's east end, home to Madrid's famous Golden Triangle of art museums and El Retiro Park, with the western side, where the opulent Royal Palace sits.

Michael heads for an early lunch at a restaurant he knows well in the Old Town. Madrid is home to around 10,000 restaurants, and this institution was founded in 1725 making it the world's oldest restaurant with a wood fired oven that hasn't gone out in 300 years, apparently. There's only one dish on the menu: suckling pig.

For the more adventurous there are plenty of surprises in store. Hotel bars with a shady history of espionage, a traditional confectioner who makes a classic Spanish nougat, and a bespoke tailor specialising in a very stylish cape, all come into play.

For the culture vultures, Madrid doesn't disappoint either. Michael goes behind-the-scenes of the opera house El Teatro Real, open to the public seven days a week. He visits one of the world's greatest art collections, and finds time for the Royal Palace, one of Europe's largest with almost 3500 rooms, many of which are open to the public. Perfect on a Long Weekend getaway.

During his Long Weekend Michael also enjoys an Ecuadorian feast in the bohemian neighbourhood of Malasaňa, and a fantastic seafood lunch, grilled fresh over charcoal, in a little-known suburb outside the centre.

In between the hustle and bustle, Michael finds time to relax in the inner-city oasis that is El Retiro Park, once exclusive to the King and royal court, before squeezing in a visit to the family flat where he stayed as a boy, in the years after the Spanish Civil War.