Valencia, Spain – Day 10

July 4, 2015

The Fourth of July! It was weird not being in the US to celebrate it!! I hope everyone had a fun time celebrating Independence Day with friends and family 🙂

Today we got a provided breakfast on the ninth floor of the hotel where there was a really great view of Valencia.

After breakfast we got on the bus and headed to Albufera for a boat cruise and paella. On the way there we made a quick stop in a random city where we hiked to a beach and back. The beach was really beautiful, but the walk in and out was not so fun. We got to Lake Albufera for the boat cruise and were met with a lot of surprises. We had no indication that these would be small wooden boats and the lake was hidden by reeds and rice fields so you almost didn’t see it! It was pretty crowded fitting 25 people on the small wooden boat. Lake Albufera used to be where the hosted the World Cup boat races and we saw lots of sail boats out racing. You have to be a local to sail here though, because the lake is protected because it used to be so heavily polluted. The boat cruise ended up being nice though. It wasn’t what we had expected, but it was an experience we wouldn’t have had on our own.

After the boat cruise we went to a restaurant for some paella. Albufera is known for their paella because of their rice crops and they definitely delivered.  The rice here is a shorter grain rice. We had a chicken paella and it was so, so yummy!!

Then we bused back to Valencia. On the way back to the hotel we had the option to be dropped off at the Art and Science Museums we visited yesterday. This time 22 of us decided to actually go inside because the museum is interactive like the Exploratorium in SF. So we went in and played with the exhibits for a few hours.

After that some of us caught some taxis back to Cathedral Dome Square near the hotel and went to go visit the Valencia Cathedral and to see the Holy Grail. We got there 30 minutes before free entry so we decided to go to a bar nearby and get some coupas of Agua de Valencia. Agua de Valencia is orange juice, cava, vodka, and gin.

Then we went back to the Cathedral and looked around inside at the intricate detailing and religious artifacts. We may or may not have (definitely did) crashed a wedding to see the Holy Grail because it is in a room where a wedding was taking place right in front of it. Oops.

After, everyone split up to do different things so I ended up wandering around Valencia and checking out some of the boutiques and stores.

I came back to the hotel changed and then we headed out to get some dinner. After dinner we went back to the hotel briefly before going to watch fireworks that were taking place for the Festival of July in Valencia. Ironic that we ended up getting to see fireworks after all on the fourth!! 🙂

Then we went to a bar that we went to last night because they offered us free drinks again. Then we took taxis to Club Animales on the beach. Super cool club!

xoxo J