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Published: November 19th 2010
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Valencia, Spain
So, I had briefly been to Valencia earlier in my travels when I was visiting Pablo in Benicassim. We were only in Valencia for a few hours though, we just drove through the city and saw Pablo's apartment. We also had lunch and did some shopping. This time we did more touristy things. But...
I almost missed my flight here!!!! Well, not quite but I was cutting it close. I was a little disoriented after our game on saturday and so I momentarily forgot which terminal I usually fly out of with Ryan air and easyjet, which are in terminal one. And it didn't say it on my boardig pass. So I got off the metro between the two terminal stops and was really stressing for a second then finally asked someone. The walk from the metro to the actual check in area is kinda long too. Then when I got into the terminal I had to find the Ryan air passport check, but totally walked right by it and ended up walking through all the three terminal check in areas!!!! Then walked back and found it, five minutes before the check in area closed. Luckily security
in Europe tends to go pretty quick and I got there fine.
Found Pablo at the airport pretty fine too, but was unsure if I wa in the right area. At airports in Europe when you walk out right away it's always into the taxi station not passenger pick up. Kinda weird I think.
Then we dropped my stuff and went out to tapas with Pablo and some of his friends at brassablanca. I had French fries and falafel. AWESOME. Exactly what I wanted!!! Haha. Barcelona was playing villareal so we watched that game. It was hilaious cause me and Pablo weretalking thy whole game and his friends were silent watching the game hahahah. His friends were really nice tho.
Then we went to this other bar where we got a few drinks and then got these tickets to get into this bigger bar/ club later. There were sooo many cute guys!!!! So many. So cute. I never see guys this cute in Madrid!! Then we went to boltellon, Spanish for drinking inthe streets before you go into a club. Except that we boktelloned for like hours. Probly from 2 am until 5. And me and Pablo
went in and out of the club. It was super crowded inthere. Mostly we went in there to use the bathroom and sometimes to get warm cause it was freeeeezing outside and super windy. Still fun tho. I talked to a bunch of his friends and thy were totally awesome. I liked them better than his friends in benicassim that I met, I think only because I spoke more Spanish now and they spoke more English. I had a lot of fun actually talking to them, especially this one guy whose name was Juan but they called him pedrito. Haha. I drank so many rum and cokes tht night thoooo! We didn't go home until like six and didn't go to bed till like seven. Aaasah! It was fun tho on the way home Pablo tried to teach me how to learn stick shift. I really want to learn. Like realllly. I slept like a baby until two pm!
There was a formula one race on that day an this Spanish racer was supposed to do really well, maybe win. So Pablo was gonna have a bunch of friends over to watch it cause he has a projector that
goes onto this huge white wall. Haha only pedrito came because when we left the oters were still there and drinking and so they were too hungover. We had pasta, which was actually amazing cause pablos mom had made this sauce tht was sooo good and fresh. The race was cool to watch cause I'd never seen one before. This German guy won that was 23!!! Crazy.
Then we just hung out for a bit and then went on a bike ride with these city bikes. You pay 18 euro a year and have this crd and then you can use any of these bikes that are stationed all over the city. It's a reallly cool idea. There are bikes like every two blocks and you can leave them at any of the stations. And their wheels are solid rubber so the tires cant go flat. They're really just in the center tho. But so we took these bikes and went on an afternoon ride in Jardines Viejo Cauce del Turia. It's a dry river that has been converted into a park and has playgrounds and gardens. The river flooded one yer so the city decided to redirect the
river to the outside of the river. Crazy engineering feat!!! But this city is all about landscaping and architecture. It's totally awesome. So gorgeous. So many palm trees and flowers, they have lots of hibiscus too!! And at one end of the river they have all these architectural buildings done by this amazing architect, Calatrava. He did like five of them. This opera house which look like a darth baser head slash kinda like a Trojan hat, and a bridge, and a science museum, and this whole plaza with water and fountains. The great thing is that it's all white, except for a few parts that are purple. We were there at dusk, which made for some beautiful photos with the sun and clouds reflecting off the water and buildings. We then got some valencian horchata. Valencia specializes in making this. It's different from Mexican horchata in that it's made from this nut/fruit called chufa. It's really really good! After our bike ride we headed home. Then we went out to dinner, and went by the Catedral de Valencia and the royal palace, both which were cool to see lit up at night.
The next day Pablo had work
in the morning so I went off on my own. I went to the Jardines del Real and walked through them, found some hedge mazes and a rose garden. I also found this beeeeautiful flowering tree! Don't know what it is. But I'll post some pictures. I also found a duck pond with duck, swans and geese. Everytime I see geese I can't help but think back to the horse stables that we always went to in Hawaii and how one time this goose chased after Tiffany and bit her butt. But anyways it was feeding time there, which attracted pigeons, which in turn attracted this one fat cat! It was hilarious to watch him try and ambush the pigeons, very unsuccessfully. Then I went over to the Catedral and Plaza de la Reina. Then I went to the Real Basilica de la Virgen de los Desamparados. Quite a mouthful. I couldn't find an entrance for the Catedral, but enjoyed the outside, and was able to pop my head into the Basilica quickly while they had mass. It looked pretty gorgeous inside. I grabbed a pizza thing from Pan Pan and ate it in the Plaza de la Reina. Then
I wandered a bit through some small streets and then headed over to el Mercado Central.
I wanted to go here for two reasons, because it is one of the largest in europe supposedly and because it was close to La Lonja de Seda, which is a world heritage site. However, I was so engrossed in the market that after I was done wandering through it I completely forgot to go to La Lonja de Seda, even though it was like across the street! Oh well, a reason to go back. The market was really cool though, sooo many stalls of nuts, veggies, wine, bread, everything! Olive oil, olives...there was also one random stall that was selling only pet food and eggs. LOTS of eggs. Weird! Then I met Pablo for lunch and I had some Valencian gazpacho. It is really good! Instead of using tomato they use radish. So yummy. But so much garlic! Overall Valencia was very very beautiful, and definitely something I would go back to. The city is laid out very nicely, there was some serious planning that went into its layout and execution. There's definitely some things I didn't see, but I'd be fine doing the same things that I did the first time!
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Laurel
non-member comment
Sweet
Love the update! Valencia sounda amazing...I am jealous of all the food you get to try too! xox