Our group arrived in Valencia around noonish and were to check into our hostel, however the hostel was full and we lucked out by being given apartments to stay in! It was splendid! The apartment building was clean and close to the hostel and our piso (apartment) was great! I was rooming with the lovely ladies of Avenida de America, Krista, Andi, and Alyssa and just like any normal person would do, we immediately went exploring our new found territory. We found a massive cheatah blanket, a balcony, 2 double beds, a day bed, a kitchen, 2 bathrooms and....a fancy high tech shower! Being the curious cat I am I was playing with the settings and had it set on the "rain" setting where the water comes straight down from the top and the next setting I saw was one, that according to the image, shot up from the bottom of the shower. I had never seen this before and of course I turned the nob to check it out.... well the water doesn't shoot up from the bottom but rather directly out from the shower wall, full blast, at me. I have been mildly hit as my cat like reflexes quickly close the sliding glass doors of the shower. So now, I'm standing there with wet spots all over my shirt, staring at these power jets shooting water directly at the doors, where if you were to open the doors, the water would shoot directly into Krista's bedroom. "Guys.....we might have a problem." The group assembles but soon enough it becomes very very clear that the only way to solve this crisis is for someone to get naked and get in the shower. Given it was my doing, the only logical answer was that I had to be the one to do this. So under direction of the videographer of the situation, I stripped down, not so bravely opened the shower doors, swung my arms around untill I grasped a nob and just twisted, with no real idea what I was doing. In record time the pressure jets were defeated and once again I found myself standing mostly damp infront of a shower. Karma got me back with a cold shower the next morning and hopefully I have learned my lesson to just leave all showers be as they were.
On to more adventures!
Valencia was in the state of a festival called Las Fallas! According to Ricardo, it is originally a pagan holiday that celebrates the end of Winter, being of Spring. However, Christians adopted it in order to overtake the pagans and now it is celebrated in conjunction with the feast of St. Joseph. Since Joseph was a carpenter, local artisans build this massive, 2-3 story tall sculptures out of cardboard and wood. The process of putting up the "fallas" started the weekend we were in Valencia and Friday the festival of burning them takes places i.e. getting rid of old, starting anew. Las Fallas were very colorful, very bizarre, and sometimes creepy but they were very very grand to say the least.
Since the festival was going on, the streets were extremely crowded and there were firecrackers exploding every 2 minutes along with drum bands breaking it down and loads of botellon sessions taking place. While all the hustle and bustle was very exciting I had done some mild research on Valencia in the crisis that our tour was dreadfully boring and knew of some sweet places to check out. So with our 2 hours of free time, Krista, Nicki and I set off to discover the less exploding side of Valencia.
After much fuss over which way was which, we stumbled upon a Spanish drinking fountain, el Jardín del Turia, fresh oranges, Torres de Serranos, a sweet fountain, la Plaza de la Virgin and finally the Cathedral of Valencia. The Jardín del Turia used to be a river and with the rich riverbed a garden was created. It is absolutely stunning and also has quite a few soccer fields! I loved it!
Next, following our outstanding map, found the Torres de Serranos! If you look closely you can see the canon ball marks from the Moors! This is one of the 2 original remaining entrances to Valencia.
Finally we exhausted our 2 hour break and met up with the rest of the group to go on another exciting tour with Ricardo. If anyone would ever like to hear about the architecture of a church, I have more than enough knowledge to share. So here is the Cathedral of Valencia in which exists the one and only HOLY GRAIL... supposedly. Ricardo told us that if you are Christian you believe it is, but this was not his concern more just the design of this particular church.
After the thrilling cathedral tour, Ricky took us out to explore Valencia by foot, which meant walking through tons of crowds and stopping randomly so that he could point out various architectural details of a building and its significance might be thrown in if the architecture wasn't that great. However, Valencia is beautiful and I really enjoyed the craziness of the festival, it reminded me of Summerfest (minus the music)!
That night it was decided that we would have a night in! This does not mean that we forgot the calimotxo or coronitas just means that finally we were able to hangout with friends without having to find a crowded smoky bar. It was very pleasant after we found the space heater because Spain still does not believe in heat and I really enjoyed the chance to have some heart-to-hearts with my girls. The night ended with Krista cleaning her heart away while Andi and I celebrated the awesomeness of the cheatah blanket!
Saturday morning greeted us with a typical Spanish breakfast consisting mostly of café con leche and donuts/churros with sugar! Yeah for caffiene/sugar highs! So not only were our spirits lifted because of the crazy sugar intake, but we were off to the beach and SUNSHINE! I don't think I have ever been more excited to see sunlight in my entire life! Madrid has been awfully rainy lately and to finally feel the warmth of the sun was sooo great. Before the beach, we took a couple hour pitstop at la Cuidad de las Artes y las Letras, or a serious of futuristic buildings that are science and art musuems. Surprisingly Ricardo did not talk about the breathtaking architecture of these buildings, instead we were able to wander and enjoy at our pace!
After this wonderful sight-seeing, we trotted off to explore the beach, write in the sand, splash in the waves, attempts some handstands and cartweels, and eat paella! nom nom nom! I love Spain.
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