宇宁: Valencia Spain

Valencia, the land of oranges
With Bill here on business trip, we decide to head off to Valencia for the weekend.

The old fortress tower of Valencia

I was always curious if Valencia has orange trees everywhere and it does! Apparently they put acid in the roots so that the oranges stay on the tree for a long time. However, that means they are no longer edible!

Orange tress in front of Valencia University

One thing about the city is there are lots of dogs in the city, and very cute ones!

Chanced upon all 3 of these guys tied and tangled up in a cafe

In fact i got a bunch of cute animals pics from Valencia!

We got in on the friday night train and the train station is really pretty.

The Valencia train station

We booked a free walking tour of Valencia that turns out not to be free as we pay what feels it's worth. But it is still an interesting experience.

The group at the museum, with Cameron as our guide

Alabaster carving in the entrance for the museum

What i learned from the tour
Valencia is Spain's 3rd largest city and used to be a retirement town for Roman soldiers. Hence the entire city has layers of Roman ruins below it.

Roman Ruins under the city

It is later occupied by Arabs and Mors which brought rice and saffron hence giving the foundation for paella, that Valencia is famous for.
Napolean subsequently walked his army through Spain to attack Portugal and left his brother in charge of Valencia after he left Spain.

A wall showing how different layers of building materials keep layering over time

After a good night's sleep, we headed out to Central Market trying horchata and empanadas.

Horchata drink

Stunning colors in central market

We end up having lunch at Central market which has a great meal of the day that includes paella for 10 euros. Checked the box for paella!

Good meal for a good price!

Church Santo Juanes

Beautiful altar and marble walls

Silk exchange Building is built by slaves and dishonest trading is punished by imprisonment at the top of the building. The slaves however played with the gargoyles and had some weird gargoyles designs =)

One of the big rooms in silk exchange building

The main meeting area in the city is Plaza de Virgin where there's a fountain to signify the 8 irrigation ditches of the Turia river. Every Thursday, the officials still come out to announce the quality of the water as a tourist attraction