Category: Valencia

Before we went to sleep last night we decided to take today off. So today was a day without a plan except to stay put in the campground.

We took advantage of our day off to sleep in until almost 9am which is not something we do often. After making coffee I took a little stroll along the beach while Ton prepared breakfast.

After breakfast we took another short walk to check out the local grocery. We purchased nothing because as we expected everything was quite expensive compared to the big groceries.

When we came back Ton told me to go find the washers as it would be a good day to knock out some laundry. When I went to buy the tokens it took to activate the washer I was told that you had to make a reservation to do laundry. The next reservation was at 4pm.

We relaxed all afternoon in our very full campground. Interestingly this campground is probably 85% Dutch. The Dutch are big travelers, but this is probably the highest number of Dutch we have seen in one campground. They seem to be enjoying themselves and have organized line dancing nights, an evening Petanque league, and a knitting club. They seem to mostly be here for long term stays and have formed friendships.

After laundry was done we headed out for another evening stroll and the beach front restaurants were starting to open up. It is interesting here because the restaurants have to cater to two different supper schedules. The British and Dutch eat around 6 pm, and the Spanish around 8 pm. I think from a restaurant perspective if you can attract both crowds you get two good seatings for dinner. It just means longer hours.

We usually count on the rain to force us to take down days. This trip we have not had any rain induced down days so I am happy that we finally decided to do it on our own, while nothing particularly interesting happened we had a nice relaxing day in a beautiful place.

Altea had a lot of hype to live up to, one of Tons sources of places to visit in Spain called it the Santorini of Spain, National Geographic called it the most beautiful village in Spain.

The drive down from Valencia was uneventful and we checked into a beach front campground that we thought would be expensive, we were happy to be told it was only €25. A good start for Altea. After settling in we decided to head into the old town but it was further than we thought. We decided to splurge on an Uber, that was also very reasonable.

We were waiting for our Uber in front of a Thai Massage shop. Thai Massage places are very common in Europe, but not as common in Spain as Northern and Central Europe. While we were waiting a lady stuck her head out and asked if I wanted a massage. Ton struck up a conversation with her in Thai and she had a nice chat until the Uber came.

We did a quick walk through town and then headed to a restaurant for lunch. The entrance was off a street and we had to descend to the dining area which turned out to be a beautiful terrace overlooking the town and ocean. We took the menu of the day. We received three appetizers, a giant salad, two nice sausages, and two beef curry empanadas. The appetizers would have been a filling lunch. I ordered salmon and Ton ordered steak. My salmon was the largest piece of fish I have ever been served in a restaurant. It was also perfectly cooked. Tons steak was also good. We weren’t done because our deserts were also huge.

The food was excellent, the service was friendly, and the views were spectacular. After a couple of tough days in Valencia, the Spain we know and love is back.

We headed down towards the ocean with a thought of walking along the beach, but a food coma set in, we decided we would save the beach for later. The Uber driver explained that this part of the “Costa Brava” is the most beautiful because unlike the towns surrounding Altea it has not been overdeveloped with high rise condos and restaurants. We can see some of them off on the horizon north of us, and according to our driver it gets worst south.

Is Altea the Santorini of Spain, truthfully we don’t know because we haven’t been to Santorini. Is it the most beautiful village in Spain, well that is a matter of taste, it is a beautiful town, but Spain is blessed with beautiful towns. To our taste it is not the most beautiful place we have visited in Spain but it would be near the top of a list of beautiful places.

We have visited Valencia three times now, and for some reason we do not enjoy ourselves here. I even googled to see what its reputation was among Spaniards, and it turns out it is pretty positive. So Ton and I are scratching our heads about why we have never enjoyed our visits here.

Our first stop today was the market as Ton wanted to look for some spices, and a local nougat based candy, and Horchata. We succeeded in finding all three. The market is enormous and the highlight of our visit. But the interactions with the shop owners were brusque, usually the shop owners we deal with are friendly and happy to explain things. Here it was tell me what you want and hand over your card.

Ton went to get a picture of the interior of the market, and one shop owner who she wasn’t even pointing the camera at shouted at her-no photos! It wasn’t the warm Spain we are used to.

After an hour in the market we headed to the central square to see what was happening. There was another tent city set up in front of the city hall that occupied about 1/3 of the square. Both the protestors and the police looked very bored.

We had tried a couple of pastries in the market, but went for a Pinxtos lunch in a very well decorated but mostly empty Basque restaurant. Without the happy crowd of Basques it wasn’t quite the same experience, though the Pinxtos were excellent.

About 2 we ran out of ideas so decided to head back to our garage. The bus was packed when we got on, but we managed to acquire seats. Yesterday, I didn’t hit the stop button and we missed our stop. I kept waiting for the crowd to thin on the bus but if anything it got denser. When we came to our stop and I stood up the way to the door was packed, but usually people will make some effort to get out of the way. In this case nobody did and the people near us who knew we were not Spanish speakers made no effort to help. So once again we missed our stop. I was very frustrated at one guy who smirked and gave me a shrug like-too bad gringo. But I held my tongue.

So during the extra 500 meters we had to walk back to the campground Ton and I came to the conclusion that any further adventures in Spain would not include Valencia. For whatever reason Valencia and the Corbin’s are not made for each other.

A couple of days ago we began talking about Valencia as a destination. We have visited twice before and it is the third largest city in Spain. Despite that it has not made much of an impression on us.

But Ton was excited to visit the market as she did remember it fondly, and we wanted to try some Paella as Valencia is famous for it. Ton did some research on why Valencia Paella is the best and told me that it is because the rice here is perfect for Paella. It is not starchy and it absorbs three time the liquid of normal rice so it can really absorb the sauce of the Paella.

I struggled with the public transport all day and after a slight deviation we found ourselves at one of the best Paella restaurants in town. You are supposed to make a reservation a day in advance, but we decided to see what would happen if we just showed up. When we asked for two the waiter asked if we had reservations, when I said no, there was a pause and I expected to be turned away. Instead he said ok 3 minutes. The Paella was delicious and the rice was different than what we have seen in other Paellas in Spain.

We’ve seen most of the tourist sites here so Ton just kind of wandered the streets afterward taking pictures of street art and street scenes. We just strolled around in the center for 90 minutes or so.

When it was time to go home I again blew it with the bus and didn’t hit the stop button for our stop. We ended up riding to the next stop which was in front of a Mercadona. Ton decided to take advantage of my carelessness by getting a little shopping in.

Our campsite tonight is unique. We are parked inside a building in an industrial area. The building is used to store RV’s long term, but they also rent space on a daily basis as Valencia lacks campgrounds. The people are really nice and it has all the facilities you would find in a campground-just inside a warehouse.

The grey weather blew thru overnight and we woke up to a cool morning with very blue skies. We headed down to the bus stop about 10:30 and joined three other couples from the campground at the bus stop. The bus ride to town was uneventful.

Our first stop for the day was the castle. Like almost all towns here and in much of Europe Denia started out as a Roman settlement and then changed hands many times in its history. The castle was built by Moors, but in this case Denia came under two different Moorish rulers during its history.

One of the most interesting things about the castle was a tunnel built under the castle in 1936 and 1937. Denia was a Republican town in the Spanish Civil War and an important port and manufacturing site. It was bombed several times by Italian bombers under command of the Fascist forces. It was also bombarded by a Fascist naval cruiser. To protect the citizens from the bombings and the naval bombardments the city constructed several shelters including the tunnel under the old castle. After Denia was captured by the Fascists the entrances to the tunnels were sealed. As the town expanded in the 1960’s the tunnel was reopened to give the citizens of the town a short cut from the old town to the new town.

We enjoyed climbing the walls of the castle, and taking in the panoramic view of the town and the surrounding countryside. There were a couple of small museums on the ground that we also spent some time in.

Ton was most excited to visit the central market; she had read that it had a good selection of goods and we were hoping to get a couple of gourmet items. The market was nice but Ton was disappointed with the selection and we ended up leaving with nothing.

After the market we embarked on what we had really come to Denia for which was lunch. One local guide said that you could eat out every single day of the year in Denia and never repeat a restaurant. I can’t confirm that, but for a relatively small town it does have a tremendous amount of restaurants and bars.

The town is known for the number of bars that specialize in vermouth which Ton likes and I love so she had identified a bar for us to try vermouth. Casa Benjamin has been in business since 1906 and their vermouth was outstanding.

She had picked out three restaurants for me to select from for lunch, but unfortunately they were all closed on Mondays. Instead we went to an area called the Magazinos that had 2 big restaurants and many small restaurants. We walked thru and surveyed our options before selecting the major restaurant. We ordered a local rice specialty which is a kind of poor mans Paella. This time we had beer with our meal.

For once a Spanish lunch hadn’t filled us completely so after spending some more time walking the town we headed to a wine bar. In the wine bar we ordered a tapa with some local wine to wash it down. We hadn’t planned on an afternoon of drinking but a combination of good weather, a nice town, and a little bit of remorse about the trip coming to an end encouraged us to get our moneys worth out of the day.

It is sometimes a small world. When we turned up at the bus stop to head back to the campground one of the couples from the morning was also there. They came up to me and asked about the bus. We began conversing and they were a couple of Dutch sisters. They asked where we were from and I told them. As the conversation continued all three of us began to feel some Deja vu. When Ton joined we all remembered that we had run into them in the spring waiting for the bus back to the campground in Zaragoza on good Friday. We spent the rest of the wait catching each other up on our activities since our last meeting, like old friends do. It is indeed a small world at times.

We decided to take advantage of Sunday to cover some miles towards Amsterdam. In Europe commercial trucks require a special (and expensive) permit to operate on Sundays so there are almost no trucks on the freeways. It makes for a good day to cover distance as we are one of the slowest vehicles on the road and I can run on cruise control for long stretches of the drive.

Another reason was the weather was kind of gray, and for the first time in 6 weeks we ran into a couple of rain showers. We selected the town of Denia to travel towards for no other reason than it was about the right distance north and had a good campground.

Most of our trip was on the A-7 which follows the Mediterranean coast. As we were driving there was about a 100 kilometer stretch where the fields on both sides of the freeway as far as you can see are covered in white plastic. The plastic covers hydroponic farms. This is the source of most of the tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers for Europe. Before the advent of the hydroponic farms this area was considered too dry for agriculture. It is one of the man made objects that can be seen clearly from space, and is referred to by NASA as the sea of plastic.

As we were driving we saw signs for a city called Benidorm. Neither of us had heard of it and didn’t expect much. To our surprise it turned out to be a city of skyscrapers. It is a major vacation destination for Europeans and caters to a middle class consumer with all inclusive stays and other affordable options. Some of the skyscrapers were quite interesting. We are constantly learning how little we know.

As we were driving Ton did some research on Denia and it turns out it is a UNESCO Cultural site for its cuisine. So it is our kind of town. It is also renown for its hiking and bird watching. We still have a little slack in our schedule so we decided after some discussion to stay another day here.

I had to talk Ton into a walk along the beach today as it was a little chilly. But once she got to the beach she enjoyed our walk along a nice promenade. There were a lot of good photo opportunities and she extended the walk far beyond what I intended.

While the town did not make a good first impression on us, the beach front near the campground is giving us hope that the center of town will be nicer than the suburbs we drove thru to get here.

Today we visited the third largest city in Spain. Valencia didn’t make a big impression on Ton or me during our first visit. It wasn’t bad it just wasn’t that memorable. So for me at least it felt like a first visit as I could only vaguely recall what we had seen here last time. For Ton, she had more complete memories of the town, it just had not made a strong impression on her. Of course, for Stephen and Kit it was their first visit.

Our campground feels like it is quite a way out of town, so I was surprised when I punched in the city center on google that the ride into town was only about 20 minutes. So the day got off to a good start as we arrived quickly in the Plaza of the Virgins.

We debated whether to join a free tour, but after some thought we decided to tackle the city on our own. So of course we headed off to the Cathedral first. It was impressive of course, but not particularly memorable. We were more impressed with some of the towers we passed in route to the Cathedral.

We next went to the city hall which is located on a monumental square surrounded by 8 and 9 story buildings. The city hall is an impressive building, but what struck me was that the square was constructed in the 1880’s when most of the city walls were torn down. So the square is relatively new construction which explains why the buildings are a little taller than those that usually surround these major squares.

Ton was joking as we walked today that we have a pattern down for visiting cities, first the Cathedral, then the main square, and then the market. So we headed off to the central market.

The market was the highlight of the day. It is quite large, and like Murcia still focuses on selling unprepared food. There was a dizzying array of fish, meat, spices, alcohol, vegetables, and fruit to look at. Ton was in heaven. I tried a Horchata which is a famous drink from Valencia made from almonds. It was better than I expected, and Ton really liked it.

The next hour was spent going from stall to stall looking at what was on offer. Valencia claims the invention of Paella. In our time we have eaten a great deal of Paella in Spain, and Ton had made it clear that whatever we had for lunch it was not going to be Paella. So while we saw a lot of Paella being produced to take home, we were not tempted.

After the market Ton wanted to look at a section of town that is famous for street art. We never quite found the center of it, but did see a few buildings with nice art on them.

After our quest for street art, we stumbled onto a nice tapas place. Stephens one question to the waitress was did they have Sangria, she replied of course so we sat down. Sangria was Stephens number 1 priority for lunch as he realized we had not had any on the trip and he could not return to the US from Spain without tasting Sangria. It was delicious.

After lunch we were on our way to the Serranos towers, when we noticed a museum that had an interesting courtyard. We poked our head in and a lady informed us that it was free today. The museum was located in a Gothic era convent, so without the art the building was fascinating.

The art was very modern, and some was done digitally which is not something I have experienced before. I found it fascinating and really enjoyed it. I was happy that we had wandered across it in our walk.

Our final stop for the day was at the Serrano Towers which was the old main entrance to the old town when it was walled. Today the various gates from the walls are all that remain as the walls were removed over the years to make for better flow within the city. The Serrano Towers are impressive.

Stephen and Kit decided they wanted to climb the tower which is about 200 steps. Ton and I volunteered to watch their packs so they could be unencumbered for their climb. So while they did the climb Ton and I sat in the shade on a nice bench.

After the tower we headed back towards the bus to the campground. While the distance to the bus stop was relatively short, it took a while as there was Gelato to be eaten as well as some last minute gifts to be bought. We finished our day off with another game of Portuguese Rummy.

I think we did Valencia a disservice after our first visit. After today Ton and I wished we had another day or two to visit so we could continue exploring Valencia. There is more to the city than we realized after our first visit.

We operated on a laid back schedule today. Wake up when we were ready, drive 200 kilometers to Valencia and find a place to settle in for the day. We arrived around 1pm and settled into the campground which is in a national park

After a shared lunch everyone spontaneously declared it would be a good time for a siesta. So after a good siesta that lasted until about 6pm we all reconvened for dinner.

After dinner we walked to the beach to view sunset. The beach was really wide and long, but empty. Stephen had walked down during the siesta and said there were a few people on the beach earlier, but they had all left by the time we got there. All in all a quiet relaxed day that is pretty boring to write about.