Touring Western Europe -Spain-Valencia, Please Can I Stay?

Wow! Oh my goodness! This is it! We have been looking for a city that makes us want to return and actually try life as a local for three months and this could be it! I am so excited…………………

On Wednesday, we travelled from Granada back to Madrid Atocha and then using our previously learnt Cercanias train knowledge (see my blog on Madrid) we transferred across the city to Madrid Chamartin. We boarded our train to Valencia, heading south east out of Madrid towards the coast. Arriving into Valencia, it’s a quick transfer by taxi to our Air BnB -a one bedroom accommodation on the fourth floor of an apartment block, ideally located thirty minutes walk from both the old town and the beach!

Thursday morning dawns bright and clear, the temperature is set to hit 32 degrees and we are heading into the historical old town. Armed with my trusty Lonely Planet guide we arrive at the Plaza de Ayuntamiento. The plan is to complete a one hour self guided walk giving us an introduction to the major historical sights and monuments. Then we are going to head to the park for lunch, before moving onto the Museu Faller de Valencia and the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias.
Little did we know that having completed our first day in Valencia we would be returning to our apartment talking about when to return. Here are the first two reasons why…………….

Mercado Central
All the cities in Spain we have visited on this trip have had markets. These vary in size but not totally in content. Valencia seems to have many markets but Mercado Central, in the old town, is the largest, housed in a wonderful Modernista building.

Hubby and I live, for different reasons, a non alcoholic lifestyle. Additionally we have never smoked and so food is our thing. Not your fancy “pretty food” restaurants but just tasty, healthy, farm to fork style food.
We love trying food from all different countries, as well as regional specialities, and have a plethora of recipe books which we dip into regularly to create food together at home. Life is never boring for us when it comes to food, we probably eat at least 200 different meals a year!

When I walked into this market it just felt like I had died and gone to heaven! There was so many beautiful raw ingredients laid out with care and attention and the smell was just an assault on the senses.
The market is buzzing with a mixture of locals buying their shopping, with an array of pull along trolleys, and tourists wandering at will. I’d read beforehand that there are two invisible rules -Don’t touch the food and photos don’t pay the bills, so be discreet when using your camera.
I have to walk around in a regimented fashion, up and down the aisles, for fear of missing something. It might seem a bit mad but I am so excited, everywhere you turn there is fresh food.

What happened back home? Where did markets like this go? Are we, as a nation, so caught up in consumerism that we cannot shop for food anywhere but in a supermarket?

This market alone gives me an incentive to return. I want to experience this, jumping on the bus outside my apartment, riding 20 minutes into town and then having that freedom to choose my food for the next few days. Not having to plan, just being inspired by what is there, allowing my imagination to create tasty meals, before catching the bus back again.

As it is we shop purely for lunch today and put together a picnic for our trip to the park later:-
We buy a boccadillo each (1.40 euros). If you are not familiar with this type of bread snack I came across an article on line which explains the difference between this and a sandwich “https://www.thespruceeats.com/sandwich-vs-bocadillo-3083603”.
Contrary to this article my tuna roll has chopped olives in it!

Next we pick up two plastic pots of pickles at 1 euro each. These come with a cocktail stick and contain a variety of pickled gherkins, olives, cauliflower, carrot, beans etc.

Then we purchase two chicken empanadas. Spanish empanadas are half-circle shaped pastries that contain different meats, seafood, vegetables and sauces as fillings.
Finally we pick up a dessert. Hubby opts for home made cookies and I buy a home made slice of tiramisu.
Everything is safely stowed in a carrier bag we had brought with us and secured in the rucksack. Walking back out the door through which we had entered we bid a sorrowful goodbye to the market and continue on our walk.

The walk takes us to the Plaza del Tossal, the Torres de Quart, the Torres de Serranos and up the Calle de Caballeros to the Plaza de la Virgen before turning back on ourselves and entering the park.

Jardines del Turia
The city of Valencia had always been subject to flooding from the River Turin which snaked its way from west to east across the city. In 1957 the city was devastated by dramatic flooding with over sixty lives being lost.
Determined not to let this tragedy happen again, the river was diverted south of the city.
Local authorities wanted to turn the old river bed into a highway. But the city’s inhabitants fiercely opposed this idea, won their case and in the 1980s, the old river bed was transformed into a vast park area: the Tùria Gardens.
The gardens cover 270 acres and extend for 7 kms. Dotted with pine and palm trees, fountains, benches and picnic tables the park provides an oasis of calm and a refreshing break from the city’s hustle and bustle.
Wherever you go in Spain, whichever city you are in there is always a park. Every park offers benches and you often see someone reading a book, they could be eighteen or eighty years old, it could be a normal paperback or a kindle. It’s like they all just value this open space that they can come to and relax.
It is here we settle down for our picnic, enjoying the fabulously fresh food purchased at the market whilst relaxing on the grass in the sun and watching the world go by. Everyone is here- the midday joggers, skaters and electric scooters, the dog walkers and the couples catching time together having lunch.

Valencia is a city committed to encouraging alternative modes of transport. Electric scooters are rife and being a fairly flat city, bike hire shops are everywhere. Interestingly the cycle lanes in this city are a sub section of the pavement and not the road which to be honest seems a whole lot safer.

The Catalan architect Ricardo Bofill is primarily recognised for the development of the park and it was inaugurated in 1986. It is still crossed by the eighteen original bridges that stretched across the river. It passes by the city’s main museums and monuments on either bank.
The Cabecera Park and Bioparc border the huge gardens to the west, neither of which we have had time to visit, whilst the futuristic City of Arts and Sciences border it on the opposite side, near the mouth of the river. This is mentioned in my second article about this wonderful city.

We force ourselves back to our feet and heading east we pass under the beautiful Pont de las Flores or Bridge of Flowers, followed by the Puente del Mar with its ten pointed arches. We stop briefly to admire the Palau de la Musica in its lovely lakeside setting. This musical venue for concerts and orchestra performances again adds to the park’s attraction.

In every park we have visited, thus far, in Spain there is always a playground. The playgrounds are clean, they are not vandalised or graffitied, it’s like there is just this respect for what has been provided that we don’t see that often in England.
The Jardines del Turia is no exception and just before we leave to head away to the Museu Faller de Valencia we come across Gulliver.

From ground level you would not perceive that this massive play structure featuring a multitude of stairs and slides is a giant sculpture of Gulliver. Almost seventy meters long and nine high, covering an area of 15,000 m2, he is led on his back, tied to the ground and motionless. But view it from above from one of the walkways at street level and all becomes apparent.
Children can climb onto the fingers, hair and legs of this giant and slide down them like Lilliputians.
This is seriously a “one of a kind” children’s play park and I am in awe of the design and its size. Those are people just to the left of this monolith in my picture!

On leaving the park, which we return to again later in order to visit the Ciudad de las Artes, we both realise we have experienced something quite phenomenal. Somewhere that warrants further exploration, a place where we can see ourselves enjoying retirement in quiet seclusion for a while whilst also inviting others to experience this wonderful city.

NB:

This is part ten in my series of posts about our tour of Western Europe. Why not read the previous posts and then follow us on our journey as we continue to explore this lovely part of the world?

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