Valencia, Oranges, The Americas Cup, yet more paella and the Holy Grail

---

Valencia, land of Oranges was a very cool city. It had a huge park in it that used to be a river, it flooded the city once upon a time so they decided to turn it into a park! The only bad thing was that we were there on a Saturday and a Sunday, and Sundays in europe are pretty much dead. Still, we managed to have a night out drinking Agua de Valencia, which is freshly squeezed orange juice, champagne and vodka, one of my favourite spanish drinks so far. We saw a traditional spanish band playing which was awesome, and just generally soaked up the atmosphere. The next day we wandered down to the beach which was massive, and filled with people as it was a sunday. It was really hot, about 36 degrees and the water was like bath water. We then wandered over to the site where the Americas Cup is being held. As Switzerland won the last Cup and is a land locked country Valencia put in a bid to have it there and won. The actual race is next year, but we managed to see one of the heats for it, involving the kiwis and Switzerland, and also saw the cup itself. That was pretty cool, we saw the inscription of 1983 when Australia won it. The hostel we stayed at was one of the best so far. It had a roof top terrace, where a real spanish chef showed us how to cook paella. He was an absolute crack up. Most of us didnt speak spanish so he was dancing around trying to make us understand how to cook it. Also went to see the Holy Grail as blessed by Pope John Paul in 1992....was kinda cool, nothing like the ones in Indianna Jones thogh....

---