More Than Oranges

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Left over in my room at my homestay in Barcelona are many Spain travel guidebooks which used to belong to students like me. In these guidebooks are suggested places to visit and things to see while traveling in Spain. All three of these books barely even bother to mention the third largest city in Spain, Valencia. Maybe this has something to do with Valencia not paying the right people, because after visiting I can't think of any reason why Valencia shouldn't be a major stop on any trip to Spain. I am actually glad that the guidebooks didn't give Valencia the praise it deserved, because there were far less tourists and a lot more character. Plus it only cost me a 52 euro roundtrip bus ticket from Barcelona.

My bus left Barcelona at 7:00am and arrived in Valencia some time around 11:00am. I had on me a backpack with a couple sack lunches and a water bottle, and duffel of clothes, and a google maps printout of the area of Valencia with the most hostels. I managed to find the metro, which was nowhere near as easy to use as the metro in Barcelona. It would have been much easier to take a taxi, but they are expensive and I like adventure. I got off the metro at the "Colon" metro stop (accent over the o), and headed to the closest hostel on my print out. Little did I know that Valencia is a popular stop for young backpackers, and getting a hostel on the weekend without reservations is pretty difficult. The lady behind the desk was nice enough to call about ten places for me, and only one had room but it was a double and would put me under 48 euro for a night. She gave me general directions to the place on my map and I headed out.

My next decision some of you might not understand. Instead of going around town trying to find a better deal or get the double room, I decided not to waste my day on such things and started off to sight see. I was in the Cuidad Vella, or the old part of Valencia at the time, which is one of the best sightseeing spots in the city. I came upon the Plaza of the Cathedral of Valencia first. The first eight pictures are from the Cathedral and the surrounding area. While walking around in Valencia I had a map, but I wasn't really using it. I figured there was lots to see so walking in any random direction would work out just fine. And it did. After the cathedral I stumbled upon what were either two very bad street cleaners, or two very good street performers. Although at the time I was watching them they were practicing, no music on and one guy showing the other what to do. It was pretty funny to watch, but I'm sure someday they will be a very good act. I kept walking and eventually came upon a large battlement, which appeared to be a medieval gate entrance to the city. The two elevated pictures of Valencia show a small portion of the city. In one you will see a narrow strip of green with a soccer field in the middle. This actually used to be a river bed, but because of the rivers tendency to flood it was diverted. The left over dry bed has been turned into a multipurpose park, meandering through the city and containing anything from soccer fields, fairs, and the City of Arts and Sciences with I will discuss later. After eating lunch atop the battlement and getting kicked out by the gatekeeper, I decided to walk along the river bed. Many old roman looking bridges crossed the bed, some allowing cars and others not. Out of nowhere and in sharp contrast to the roman bridges, a gleaming white bridge crosses the river. There is a shot from under this bridge, where glass triangles let light into the metro stop below.

At this point, some hours later, I decided to begin my hostel search again. I looked on the map and found the only two star hotel in the city, but it was pretty expensive too. I finally headed to the original place that offered the twin room, called the Russafa Youth Hostel. The man at the desk was very nice, and instead of charging me the standard 48 euro for a double, he charged me 30 euro for a night because I was alone. It had a kitchen, internet, showers, and a fan in the room so it was well worth it.

After settling in at the hostel I headed to the most popular tourist destination in Valencia, La Cuidad de Las Artes y Ciecncias. It was designed by world famous architect and sculptor Santiago Calatrava and has been a work in progress since 1996. This complex was probably the single coolest thing I have seen is Spain. The building that looks like a spaceship is the performing arts building and the dome with all the windows is an Imax theater. The third building is the Natural Sciences building, and houses a Science museum similar to the Discovery Center is Boise. I paid to get into this part, which was mistake because it was more directed towards little kids. Part of the city is called the Oceanografic, a large aquarium with more cool architecture. Fore some reason the animals were being kinda weird at the aquarium. One manatee kept squishing his face against the glass. That same manatee later cornered another manatee and attempted to have sex with it. At the beluga whale exhibit, the whale came up the glass and just watched people for a good 5 minutes. It seemed to like the little girl in the picture, as it would follow her movements. In one of the underwater walkways, a shark swam up right above me and just kinda sat there for a bit. I tried to get a picture of it but it didn't turn out to well. After all my weird animal experiences, the aquarium had a night time dolphin show. This show made me conclude that dolphins are scary smart. In the minutes leading up to the show the dolphins watched the stands fill up. At the time the show was supposed to start on the dot, they disappeared. When the show didn't start they sent two back up to watch the crowd. It finally did start, and it featured dolphins doing things no animal should be able to do on command.

Although it was Saturday night I ended up just crashing out of exhaustion from the day. I knew a girl studying through my same program in Valencia, so the next day I went to the Valencia beach with her and her friends. It is a beautiful beach and extends the length of Valencia. On the beach there was a "futvoley" competition sponsored by Amstel. Futvoley is foot volleyball. It is played on the sand and is a very popular summer sport in Spain. We got free hats and got to sit behind what were probably hired gorgeous women. They were to scantily clad to be unhired locals. I also got to see the America's Cup port, which house many yachts and Marinas for different nations competition sail boats. I went straight from the Marina to the Corrida, or Bull Fight, that I had tickets for. It was a bit different from a normal bull fight, as on this night the matadors were on horses. Although it came off as a bit barbaric and torturous, it was a great experience of Spanish culture. This tradition is slowly disappearing all over Spain, as Spanish youth who were not brought up in this tradition are protesting animal cruelty. The tradition is on the verge of disappearing altogether in Catalonia, but is a ways off in parts of Spain were it is more popular. My opinion is that it is a bit sad to watch the bull be taunted and forced into submission, but these bulls live longer than the normal bull raised for meat. After their death in the corrida, they are immediately butchered and hauled off in a refrigerated truck.

After the bull fight I met up with the girl I know from school and we went out for a classic Valencian paella dinner. After all, you can't go to Valencia without trying this famous dish. We went to a pretty cheap place so it wasn't the greatest thing I've had, but it was more for the experience. After dinner we met up with her friends and went to a few bars and had a few beers. My bus out of the Valencia bus station was at 2am, so after the bar I went straight to the station. I slept the whole way back to Barcelona and arrived around 7:20am, with plenty of time to make it to class at 10.

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Photos

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Tower in Cathedral Square

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Cathedral Square

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Main entrance to the Cathedral

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Inside the Cathedral

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Second time I seen this in Spain: Old people throwing candy at people. Not hard, but this guy hit a baby.

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Chapel

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Inside the Chapel

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Square on opposite end of Cathedral

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Cool buildings

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Practicing street performers, or bored street sweepers???

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View of river bed with turf soccer field

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View from where I ate lunch

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Battlement Gate where I ate lunch

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first roman bridge with cool building in backgrouund

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Second bridge

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Cool tree on my walk down the river bed

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Modern bridge, out of nowhere

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Glass triangles under bridge

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My room in the hostel

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Bridge I walked under on the way to the CAC. They just try harder to make things look good in Europe.

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Walking up on the city. Poseidon sculpture and a nice hotel.