Valencia, a tale of two cities.

Here we are in Valencia, Spain’s third largest city, with a population of just under 800,000. We arrived yesterday by train, and what a comfortable trip it was. We covered the 380 kms in one hour and forty minutes, which is the equivalent of travelling from Wangaratta to Sydney in three and a half hours, instead of the nine hours it takes travelling with NSW Rail. Our maximum speed reached 301 kph, but you’d never know it as the carriages remained virtually motionless. The more we travel through Europe the more it becomes evident that Australia simply does not value public transport infrastructure investment. In fact, being over here really makes you fear for the future of our country, we seem so backward in our thinking. Thank god we can continue to rip up coal and iron ore to sustain our lifestyles, as I don’t believe we could continue to do so based solely on our innovation or vision. We might once have been the lucky country, but we are very much becoming dependent on what worked for us in the past.

The old part of the city contains the remains of walls, obviously once part of the city's defenses.

The Catedral in Plaza de La Virgen (nope, this is the correct spelling).

Part of the old city. The McDonalds here is said to be centuries old (lol). 

Valencia is a city of two halves; the old section and the new. The former is made up of buildings from many centuries past, right back to Roman occupation, while the newer parts of the city reflect modern Spain, including some very futuristic buildings. We took a bus this morning down to the waterfront area, which boasts one of the longest beach fronts we’ve seen anywhere. It is basically a straight stretch of beach which seems to stretch on forever. These beaches are very popular with the locals, and I imagine they would be unbearably crowded in summer. I gather Valencia is a very outdoors type of city, and why wouldn’t it be with beaches such as these on offer.

Plaza de La Virgen

Plaza del Ayuntamiento

Catedral 

The old section of the city contains some very old churches, archways and lots of plazas, what we would call squares. These are usually at the junction of very narrow, stone-paved laneways and roads, which join at a variety of angles. These days, most of these plazas contain a myriad of restaurants and cafes, serving traditional Spanish dishes and drinks to locals and tourists alike.

Where we are staying is a stone’s throw from what used to be a river which ran right through Valencia, only these days it is a continuous park. Apparently, the river was diverted away from the city in the 1950s, following a devastating flood. It seems a shame to lose a river, but I guess acquiring a huge park is not a bad consolation prize.

We have now been to Spain’s three biggest cities, and we find all of them to be unique in their feel. Madrid is very much the modern metropolis, Barcelona a mecca for lovers of art, culture and architecture and Valencia is, well to be honest, quite difficult to categorize. It certainly has a bit of a North African feel to it, but this is going to become more pronounced to us as we venture further south over the next two weeks. Although it is still very Catholic here, you can see a fair bit of Moorish influence in some of the buildings.

The weather has turned a little today, no rain but very cloudy, which has kept the temperatures down in the mid-twenties. Tomorrow, if it clears up, we'll try swimming with the locals. If that fails, there's always Malaga over the next week or so.

That's Alison looking very Spanish. This was a beautiful little arcade.

Post Script: We received news yesterday that we welcomed a new member to our family. No, not another baby, a doctor. Congratulations Dr. Imogen Evans, you have our undying admiration and our love.

Walk like an Egyptian....

Today is Thursday, which means tomorrow we leave Madrid for Valencia. I think when it comes time to leave, they are going to have to pry me from the room; I simply do not want to leave. Madrid is simply amazing. Things are pretty slow to get started in the morning (for that matter, so is Alison), but the shops and restaurants are open well into the night, you can even go shopping in the big stores at 11.00 pm.

For lunch today we found our way to the San Miguel markets, where we had a variety of tapas washed down with a large beer (god that wife of mine can drink). The food was great and the variety almost limitless. Whilst we shared a plate of empanadas, some croquettes and some seafood tapa, we could have kept eating all afternoon. Although we were both full as googs, we couldn’t resist a couple of cakes so large I’m pretty sure they could have feed a small African village for a month. Needless to say, we couldn’t finish them. What’s that my mum used to say about my eyes and my belly?

San Miguel markets, where we had our tapas for lunch.

This morning we visited the Palacio Real de Madrid, or Royal Palace. Just like Versailles, Vienna and other palaces we’ve visited, it was grand to the point of the ridiculous. It has never amazed me how people line up for hours and then pay considerable amounts of money to see how obscenely wealthy aristocrats used to live in the sort of luxury we would condemn outright today. Maybe there’s just a small part in all of us that wishes it could be us. Anyway, the palace was beautiful and we were glad we could add this to our list.

The Palacio Read de Madrid.

This morning we also visited a genuine Egyptian monument, Templo de Debod, which sits atop the Parque del Oeste. The view from the Madrid high spot is quite spectacular, and we intend to return there this evening, along with most of Madrid, to watch the sun set.

Tempo de Debod

The monument was given as a present to the Spanish people for helping to save the temples of Nubia and Abu Simbel when Lake Nasser was flooded to create the Aswan High Dam. It was amazing to be able to walk into a structure that was created well over 2000 years ago, in the time of the Roman occupation of Egypt, and some parts over 3000 years ago in the Nubian period.

The Cathedral Almudena

We certainly don't want to leave, but I know there will be more great places to come. And, we do get to return to Madrid for one more night before we leave to fly home. Who knows, I might even decide to stay.

Real Madrid for sure

Our first full day in Madrid was, as expected, full of sightseeing and experiences. We commenced the day with breakfast in a little coffee shop, followed by a delightful stroll through some of the loveliest gardens we’ve seen on our travels anywhere, including Rome and Florence.  After several hours enjoying the peace and tranquility of verdant greenery, we walked along some of Madrid’s beautiful tree-lined boulevards, reminiscent in some ways of Paris, although probably not quite as grandiose. The weather was absolutely perfect all day, sunny and warm, with the temperature maxing out at around 29 degrees and not even a breath of wind to ruffle the hair.

We were intending to visit Madrid’s magnificent Prado Museum, which houses some of Europe’s finest art collections, but we have left that for Wednesday. We had heard a little about the river which runs through the city, and the recent development which has taken place along it, so decided to take a short train trip to take a look. The river itself, Madrid Rio, was nothing to rave about, but we decided to forgo the train trip back and walked instead, a decision which involved a couple of hours of walking but gave us an opportunity to see some of the more esoteric parts of the city, probably not seen by too many tourists.

Puerta de Alcala, one of the many arches found around Madrid, although not all are as grand as this one.

Monumento Al Fonso XII, inside the beautiful Parque del Retiro.

The Parque del Retiro has many lovely thoroughfares lined with beautiful trees. We just loved exploring this green oasis.

A typical street view in Madrid, with a number of roads joining at all sorts of angles. The man in the foreground is on his phone to me; I'm telling him to get the hell out of my photo. Unfortunately, my Spanish is not great.

Our walking tour took us past the home of one of Madrid’s three football teams (that’s soccer to all you uninitiated), Club Atletico de Madrid. After taking about 183 photos for Elizabeth and Pete, that’s one photo from every conceivable angle, we continued walking until we came across a most magnificent square, called the Plaza Mayor. It reminded us a little of the square in Ceske Budejovice, but with many, many more tourists.

This is the beautiful Plaza Mayor, where we had our evening meal (our sangrias are in the foreground). This square is over 400 years old, and has hosted countless thousands of ceremonies.

I just loved this whole street of book sellers; it reminded me very much of Paris (I know, I know, now I'm just showing off).

Los Jeronimos, a cathedral near the Museum Prado.

By now, the sun was beginning to set and since we’d been walking for a good two hours, we decided to take dinner at one of the many restaurants facing the open square. We both ordered paella with sangria’s to drink, both traditionally Spanish, but it’s difficult to know how authentic these ‘tourist’ dishes really are – I’d suspect not very. The good news, or bad depending which way you look at it, was that the paella really wasn’t as good as the one I make at home. In fact, I considered going out back to offer the chef a few tips, until Alison suggested it might not be the wisest thing to do. Oh well, I offered.

I really wanted to meet some of the peasant, country folk you hear so much about in Spain. Finally, I found one, although life in the country can be pretty austere - this guy looked like he hadn't had a decent meal in weeks.

The Botanic Gardens is making a real effort to attract native bees.

This is the famous Palacio de Cristal.

Not far from our accommodation we stumbled across, quite by accident, Madrid’s world famous chocolateria, San Gines, which serves another Spanish specialty, the churros dipped in a cup of piping hot, thick chocolate sauce. Although very popular with the locals, it was far too sweet for us, but we are very glad we found it, particularly since Imogen had recommended we find it (you know, the sort of recommendation which really carries the hidden message, “don’t come home if you don’t find it!”)

Today we are off to the Prado Museum, the stadium of Real Madrid (yep, another soccer club) and maybe even the venue for Madrid’s bullfights. We have decided not to see an actual fight, for pretty obvious reasons, but the stadium itself is famous and well worth a look.

We really, really love Madrid. We love the city, the weather, the people, in fact, what's not to love about this place? It definitely is Real Madrid.

Will this flight never end?

Finally, after twenty-eight hours since leaving Tullamarine, and twenty-four of those in the air, we arrived at Madrid. A two-hour stopover in Singapore, which we must have known about but simply forgot once we'd booked the flights nine months ago, plus a delay of thirty-minutes leaving Dubai because four passengers didn't turn up, and a further thirty minutes lost over Saudi Arabia for some reason not fully explained by the Captain, made for the longest trip we've ever taken. To say we were knackered upon arrival is very much an understatement. After locating the metro rail from the airport we finally arrived at our hotel on the Gran Via, one of Madrid's major roads.

This is the Gran Via, one of Madrid's main roads and where our hotel is located.

Although we didn't get to our hotel until pretty late in the day, we decided to go on a walking tour in the immediate vicinity of our accommodation. Without knowing it, we actually covered a fair bit of the tourist sites, including the Royal Palace, Almudena's Cathedral, Jardine of Sabatini and Puerta del Sol, where all the roads in Madrid start and everyone celebrates Spain's major events.

One side of the Royal Palace. This beautiful pond is in the Jardine de Sabatini

What we've noticed on our first morning here is that the working day is a little different to back home. For example, many of the shops don't actually open until 10.00 am, but they stay open until very late into the night. Even some of the major tourist attractions, like the Palacio Real (the Royal Palace) operate until 8.00 pm. I guess this reflects the pretty harsh Spanish summer and harks back to the days when much of Spain used to take an afternoon siesta and not come back to life until well into the evening.

This is the Royal Palace, Palacia Real, where the Kings of Spain lived for hundreds of years. Very popular with tourists.

The architecture of many of Madrid's buildings is typically Spanish. 

There are lots of meeting areas where people congregate, and usually a couple of restaurants and bars. Madrid is very much 'plein air', as the French would say.

Today, it's off to Madrid's botanic gardens (get some ideas for back home) and a few more of the must-sees. The weather looks like being typical for this time of the year, sunny and warm. So far, we really like Madrid; it's a great blend of traditional and modern metropolis with lots to see and do. So, I guess I'd better get off the laptop and start seeing it.

Madrid deja vu

The last time I wrote a post we were on our way to Madrid airport from Barcelona. With three weeks still to go on our adventure through Spain some family matters necessitated we return home without delay. Little did we know at the time, but waiting for us upon our return was Xavier, our first grandson. Needless to say, we were disappointed about truncating our trip, but getting to hold Xavier for the first time quickly dissolved any lingering regrets. Ten months on and he is a cheeky and incredibly beautiful little boy, and we are glad we were there to see him barely 24 hours old.

But the feelings of unfinished business was never far from our thoughts. So, with only two weeks of Long Service Leave left before we finally retire at the end of the year, we made the decision to return to Spain to complete what we couldn't last year. Our Return to Spain journey this year starts in Madrid, somewhat appropriately as this is where it came to an end last year, and includes visits to Valencia, Seville, Cordoba, Granada and Malaga, and features heavily around the region known as Andalucia in southern Spain. It is the part of Spain mostly closely associated with that country's Moorish history, and there is a strong north African influence the further south you travel. Unlike the rest of catholic Spain, Andalucia is quite Islamic in its culture. As we are a little earlier in the year this time, we are hoping the weather is a little more favourable, and I think a swim in the mild waters off the Costa del sol is definitely on the cards.

With only a few days left before we fly out, and a wedding to attend before we leave, there is still lots to do around the property. I mow the three acres of lawn one day and before I've finished I almost need to start again, such is the rate of growth. It's anyone's guess what it will look like in four week's time. There is an omnipresent danger in leaving five acres during this time of the year for an extended period, everything grows at an exaggerated rate: the grass, the weeds, the mounds of chook poo, everything.

I invite you to follow our journey on the blog; feel free to comment if you like, as we really enjoy hearing from you. Fingers crossed that this time we complete the trip without incident.