It’s raining but perhaps you’ve already been to all the museums, or maybe you just fancy something a bit less obvious such as spending the afternoon in a mercado, doing a no-frills bar crawl around a barrio you haven’t visited before, exploring the labyrinthine tunnels of the old tobacco factory or finally enjoying it being cool enough to eat hearty food again! Here are 10 rainy-day activities that you won’t find anywhere else on the Madrinternet…

An elderly woman dressed in all black is straddling the wrong side of a first-floor balcony. Standing up there with her is another elderly woman wearing a floral smock, bellowing unsolicited advice about how her friend should tie up the bunting. Fierce high-rise arguing descending into laughing, and I watch on in horror yet reassurance that, somehow, these ladies have got it handled. After all, it is quite possibly their 90th year of decorating the streets.

One of the sites where Franco’s army would learn to build railroads, bridges and trenches now hosts an army of Madrid’s underground artists. Welcome to Zapadores (trenchers), Madrid’s City of Art. 

What is an urban sky frame? It’s a worm’s-eye view centring around the sky, almost seamlessly framed by urban structures (a term invented right here, right now).

They’re perfectly placed should you spontaneously decide to get your shoes shined, grab a bag of chestnuts or pick up a newspaper, but these gifts of the street are rewarded only to those who slow down. Allow yourself an extra five minutes to get to the nearest no-frills bar, and you’ll witness our streets come alive with a multi-generational community of micro shops.

Welcome to the untimely ossuary of Madrid’s extinct shops, bars and restaurants – an emotive collection of defunct signage from Madrid’s long-lost traditional businesses.

Our city gardens are something to be treasured dearly, with so many being lost over the years. Hundreds of grassy nooks and micro orchards have become victim to our ever-expanding metropolis, leaving those that remain with an almost mythical status.

I’ve got a confession to make: I’m a little bit obsessed with confessionals. I suspect this might be one of the weirdest things a priest could ever be told through a latticed window, but although I have no intention of repenting my curiosity-related sins, an explanation might be helpful…

Those hermetic voile curtains are partly to preserve Café El Despertar’s clandestine atmosphere, they’re but mostly there to deter the naive walk-in customer. The steely elderly owner, with his enviable beard, is interested only in clientele who are specifically here for his jazz music, and most certainly not the police, who, for good reason, he constantly fears.

Unless you live on this quiet, narrow street in Lavapiés, there’s almost no reason for you to walk down it – that is, unless you’re going to the Duck Church. Nestled into the ground floor of a centenarian building lives a tiny temple devoted to the rubber duck, and its priest is Leo Bassi, a 66-year-old clown who was born on tour.

Casa Postal is an unfinished, no-frills cabinet of curiosities that will transport you back to your childhood, your mother’s childhood, your grandmother’s childhood and beyond if you let your imagination take you there.

Nathan Brenville likes to explore his local barrio with sketchbook in hand, believing that drawing is the best way to notice the details of his surroundings. While doing so, it often leads to some interesting conversations with passers-by, which is exactly how Nathan met Encarni.

When I asked Jose Luis Jiménez who the people in the photographs were, he spent the next half hour telling me stories from his childhood and showing me pictures taken by his friends from all over the world.

“Do you know about El Comunista? It’s painted Ruby red for people who can’t read – just like the other bodegas – and when you step inside, you’ll see the Spain my great-grandparents knew”

Ex-monk Don Justo survived the Spanish Civil War and even tuberculosis, yet at 93 years old, he knows doesn’t have long left. He’s just a decade away from completing his 60-year mission to build a life-size cathedral, but when the local city council want it demolished, the question becomes, ‘who will outlive who?’