Had a great experience on this walking tour led by Jovan. He was engaging, energetic, and knew his way in and out of the city. Very knowledgeable about both history and food which was appreciated. This tour highlights historical aspects of Madrid's Plaza Mayor, theories behind the architecture of the city, the conquest and reconquest of the city, gastronomical highlights, and some fun trivia. The tour itself is 3 hours long with a break in the middle where the group stopped at a cafe to get drinks and use the restroom. Wear comfortable shoes! While the tour is officially free, tips are highly encouraged to continue the existence of the company and its excellent tour guides. read more

My husband and I signed up for the "Majestic Madrid Walking Tour" with Sandemans on the second day of our trip to Madrid. Our guide Mark did a great job showing us the city while giving us an entertaining history lesson. Not only was he very knowledgeable on the history and culture of Madrid, but he was also very friendly and took the time to get to know our group and answered any questions we had. The tour takes about 2.5 hours with a 10-15 minute coffee/bathroom break in the middle. Definitely plan to wear comfortable walking shoes, as the tour covers quite a bit of ground. Our tour started at Plaza Mayor (just took for the red Sandemans umbrella) and ended at Plaza de Isabel II. While it is free to sign up, remember to bring cash if you choose to tip your tour guides at the end. Overall, the tour was a great introduction to the city of Madrid. We learned a lot (always remember 1561!) and highly recommend the experience! read more

Sandeman's New Europe - Group photo with Mark (way left) - Tours Near Me - Madrid, M

Took the free walking tour of Madrid with Jovan Gibson as the guide. The tour was excellent, Jovan provided a ton of historical background to the areas we were walking through. The tour gives you a good introduction to the historical center of the city, I highly recommend it! At the end of the tour Jovan was able to answer questions and provided wonderful recommendations on places to visit, tapas bars and restaurants. read more

For the first time, I walked away from a Sandeman's tour without finishing it. I've done these in Dublin, Prague, Amsterdam, and Barcelona. All were spectacular and the guide for each was terrific. This time, I tried hard to get past the fast talking. I tried to get past the sales push for the flamenco dancing "at this restaurant that we're about to walk past." I tried to get past the overly self-deprecating humor. But after a half hour, I turned right while the tour kept going. On the plus side, my investment was only 45 minutes of time. Sorry to break the perfect five-star streak, but I have to be honest. read more

Sandeman's New Europe - Look for the red umbrella! - Tours Near Me - Madrid, M

Majestic Walking Tour with Jovan I've been living in and out of Madrid since 2009. I have done the FREE walking tour with SANDEMANs NEW Europe - Madrid and I loved it! I loved it so much so that I paid for the Majestic Madrid walking tour with Jovan. He provided a great walking tour with more in-depth history of Madrid and even the projects set for the future. Jovan was animated and super resourceful, I would highly recommend this tour to locals and visitors. read more

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Sandeman's New Europe walking tours are FREE. Yes free! However, your tour guide does ask for tips. That's how they get paid. So if you think your guide deserves a small or large tip at the end of a 3 hour tour, feel free to give them some money. Otherwise they might starve. No, really. Our tour guide was Mark and he was passionate about his newly adopted home. Mark is actually from Ireland and now lives in Madrid. He took us around the city giving us tidbits of history, fun facts, and juicy gossip. We started at Plaza Mayor and walked to Sobrino de Botin, the oldest restaurant in the world where Hemingway ate at and where Goya once worked. We took a rest stop near the Chocolateria San Gines and had sandwiches at Cerveceria 100 Montaditos. We walked to the house of Miguel Cervantes. We checked out the Opera house built by Queen Isabella II. We made our way back to Puerta del Sol and took pictures by the bear and madroño statue. The tour was informative and educational. It made me like Madrid a little better. Thanks to Mark and Sandeman's for providing such a great tour. They also provide paid tours like the Tapas Tour and Bar Crawl which includes the cost of drinks and food. Worth the money since my cousin and I also went on the Tapas tour. read more

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This tour came highly recommended by a friend of mine. Since this tour is free, I thought "why not?" You can give the tour guide a tip, but that isn't mandatory. Our tour guide, Gráinne, was amazing and so informative. I loved that she was from Ireland, but studied in Spain for a while and decided to stay and live there. It started raining during our tour, and Gráinne tried to get us to different places of shelter while keeping her composure and telling us all about the city of Madrid. She even used interactive demonstrations to get us involved, which were very entertaining. I really enjoyed her descriptions and explanations of everything we were seeing. I didn't even feel like we walked that much around the town, but we totally did! I loved that there was no obligation to pay, but since Gráinne was so great, I obviously gave her a tip. I wish I had done this tour on my first day in the city because I would have been able to know which hot spots to hit up and learn more about. We ended up doing this on our last day in town, and it was helpful to bringing a complete picture to my trip from what we had seen while visiting Madrid. This tour comes highly recommended by me as well! Do it, I promise you won't be disappointed! read more

I signed up for the Spanish Inquisition tour without any tapas stops. The tour guide, Joaquin was extremely and surprisingly informative about the history of Spain and the inquisition itself. He was lively and passionate about teaching us more of the heritage that some may take for granted. I thing I wasn't crazy about was that we spent more time listening to the tour guide than actually seeing more landmarks that were involved in the Inquisition. Also I wasn't aware that there was a free tour during the day that has more of a sightseeing opportunity. read more

I heard about this company's city tour through my hostel in Madrid. Our tour guide, Sebastian, was phenomenal. The way this particular tour works is that there is no up front cost, you just tip at the end. This allows you to see how you like it and gives the flexibility to the attendee. Their tour took us around the city starting from the Plaza Mayor. We traversed back alleys, saw some amazing sights but most of all heard some really interesting history and stories. What the tour lacked in distance it more than made up in entertainment value. Though it's three hours in length they do stop for a quick drink at a cafe and take the opportunity to give you more information about their paid tours. I was interested in a few of these including a daytrip tour of Toledo and a Tapas tour. Sebastian was the best guide I've ever had. He was able to relate Spain's history to every single country of the attendees on my day. Quick on his feet, he responded to any question with enthusiasm and wit. His routes through the city were impeccable and he clearly knew his stuff. His stories were interactive - he'd often grab a few of us to represent kings and queens as he told the stories. Highly recommended. I will certainly be checking out their other city tours. read more

Sebastian was the best guide ever. Perfect english and great history lessons! Best of all, this was a "Free Tour" so we didn't have to pay anything if we didn't like it. We LOVED it, so we gave Sebastian 20 euros for the two of us (about $25 USD). this is a MUST DO activity when you go to Plaza Mayor. read more

Sebastian did a great job providing a perspective of Spanish history through the tour and was very energetic. His English is very good too. He was also helpful in providing tips on Madrid and other places nearby. Always great to take this on day one of a city to get a Coles notes version on the history of the place and to get familiar with the streets and sights. read more

RSVP'd for this FREE walking tour online, but you can also just come in person the day of. The meeting point is in Plaza Mayor. They have the red umbrellas, you can't miss them. I had Joaquin Forchino as my guide. He is a very good guide! He was very enthusiastic, and energetic about his tour. He has a great personality as a tour guide, and is open to asking any questions that you may have. He speaks English very well, but he also speaks very fast. English is my primary language, so I had no problem understanding, but I could tell that some were having a bit of difficulty keeping up. So if you already have a difficult time understanding English, I would suggest following a different guide. He also does not gives tips about which places he likes or recommendations during the tour, but I'm pretty sure if you ask him he will tell you. Overall, he is a wonderful guide, and gives a wonderful tour. read more

I enjoyed this tour a lot. Our guide, Javon, was upbeat, friendly, and loved the city! He did speak very fast though and sometimes I had a hard time hearing him, but overall I thought he was great. I thought the length of the tour was good. We stopped at a cafe about halfway through which was nice in case anyone wanted to use the restrooms or get food/drink. One thing I didn't like was that our guide kept suggesting we tip (which we would, regardless), but since it was mentioned at the beginning it didn't mean to be mentioned again at the end. read more

I have being all over Europe, and if there is a Sandeman New Europe walking tour, I m taking it because the quality is heads above all others. They get it kicked off in Plaza Mayor for all of their tours here in Madrid, and you can tell that they are more popular than the other "Free Tours." The walking tours for all New Europe Tours are "FREE", tips only. To cut to the chase the: tour guides for the "free tour" operate as independent contractors, they pay the company for the amount of people that are in the group that they are leading and the tips cover their payment and it is what they operate on. Back to the tour, they are all basically college age/post college folks that have a passion for the city that they are in. Since they are young, they can take a joke or two or in our case nothing but wise cracks by me and my buddy for almost the entire trip. There is a mid-point break, and usually it is at someplace where it rather inexpensive so even you can get something to eat on a backpackers budget and there is a restroom for you to use. Just overall the guides are awesome, they even sell tickets to the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium self-guided tour at their HQs. If you are a Euro-Novice, take the free-walking tour: to get orientated to the city because they take you to almost of the places in the city center worth seeing, to get the low-down of the locals deals and steals (since the guides are all young people, they know where the deals are at) than decide how to send the rest of your time. Be warn, if you go during the "low season" they might not operate certain paid tours if there is not enough people that show up. read more

I signed up for the free walking tour of Madrid through them since I really enjoyed it in Barcelona a week ago. We had a tour guide from Colorado who got married to a Spanish lady and lived there for years. He was quite a entertainer and had lots of knowledge about cultures and histories of Madrid. 3 hour walking tour felt really short and I really enjoyed it. read more

Really enjoyed the walking tour with Enrique. He was very knowledgeable and entertaining. The 2.5 hours went by very quickly. After the tour, he gave us his contact information and directed us to some nightlife activities that was also enjoyed. Our free tour earned a nice tip; highly recommended. read more

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My favorite thing to do in any new country is take a walking tour. It helps acclimate me to the city, appreciate the history, the culture and also helps me get pointers of what to do from people who truly love the city. I have been on great ones, mediocre ones and ones that I have prayed would just end already. If you are lucky enough to get Dani as your tour guide it will be easy to see where this one fits on my rating of tours. Dani is energetic, knowledgable, and passionate about the tour that he is giving. He makes the history of the city come alive as he takes you down twists and turns of the heart of old Madrid. You may have appreciated the beauty of Madrid before his tour, but his tour will make you fall in love with this city. After the tour, he was patient enough to answer everyone's questions about where to eat, what to do and where to go. Mind you this is a free tour, he didn't have to do any of this. And to top it all off,he even offered to email you a list of his favorite places to go, where to eat and where to see great Flamenco (along with a list of great Flamenco songs)! This was easily one of my most favorite things that I did in Madrid - thanks, Dani! read more

Wonderful experience with Fabrizio. He made the experience fun. We learned so much history of Madrid in a most entertaining way. Kept a good pace and a pleasant tone. Looking forward to more. read more

Fabrizio did a terrific job making the history of Spain and Madrid come to life, informative and entertaining. Beautiful photo ops too!

Mo was my tour guide on the Sandeman's newCopenhagen Free Tour. He was lovely and charismatic, and I greatly enjoyed and appreciated his jokes and little anecdotes. He gave very neat, understandable explanations about the history of Copenhagen as well. 11/10 would recommend Mo to be your tour guide! read more

Great Pub Crawl, Majestic, & Free tours of Madrid! The tours took our experience to higher level! Thanks to our tour guides Erik and Sabella! read more

What an amazing tour!! Not to mention it's completely FREE, the tour guide named Sebastian was knowledgable and had absolutely fun charisma to present the history of the Madrid. The 2.5 hour tour walked us through the city streets and few points of interest. But this tour consent rates on the history mainly, so if you are a hist buff - you'll enjoy it just as much as I did!! Great tour and I hope to see more of it in other cities I will visit. read more

I took the free tour with Fabrizio to learn the basics about Madrid at the beginning of my trip and get my bearings. The tour ended up being so informative and enjoyable that my group of 3 decided to go back in the afternoon for another tour detailing the other side of the city. Fabrizio was great fun and knowledgeable about the area. read more

I had a great time today on the free tour of Madrid offered by Sandemans. it covered the west side of central Madrid and we got to discover so many interesting places. Fabrizio was our tour guide and did a fantastic job. He was extremely informative, gave a great history of Madrid and Spain as a whole, and was also very fun! Highly recommended. read more

Sandeman's New Europe tours are well worthwhile whatever city you are in. We were lucky to have Celia as our tour guide in Madrid. The tour was about 2.5 hours long, but you go along at a very comfortable pace. Celia was very enthusiastic, had many interesting stories and extremely helpful. She had lots of great recommendations for places to eat and things to see while on our trip, several of which we tried and we were not disappointed! The tour costs nothing, but you do tip your guide at the end. Celia is definitely a tour guide I would recommend to ask for. read more

I'm another fan of Sebastian!! I ended up in Madrid at the last minute, knowing nothing about Spain or the villa. Sebastian was very engaging and knowledgable as he showed our group around Madrid. I'm so happy I took this tour and can't wait to book more! read more