Tuesday, 2018 April 17
Jetlag hit hard - I was wide awake at roughly 2 AM. I did eventually get back to sleep. Unfortunately Krista was also hit with jetlag and didn't manage as much sleep as I did.
We left the room about 8:30 for breakfast (still delicious), then we headed towards the beach. This was a pretty good walk - about 2.5 miles. The beach itself was nice, and the weather was absolutely perfect (although I thought it was too hot, of course, but I think that whenever it's warmer than 55).
We started walking away from the beach, looking for things to do, but were surprised by how few shops there were. We did find something resembling a main drag and stopped for a quick drink at a place whose name I didn't record; I had a tiny beer and Krista had a water.
From there we walked another 1.25 miles to the Aqua Multiespacio, an open-air mall. It was a cool building and there were some nice views from the upper floors.
We hadn't eaten since breakfast so we stopped at Tommy Mel's, a surprisingly charming Spanish take on a classic 1950s American diner (plus, like every place in Spain, they had a full bar). We then headed down to the lower levels and Krista bought some cool lights at Flying Tiger Copenhagen.
Suitably fortified, we walked over to the Turia Garden. This time we descended to the riverbed level, then we started walking towards our hotel. This was another 2.5-mile walk. The garden is beautiful; we were stopping frequently to take pictures of flowers and landscaping, plus other interesting attractions. It was also full of people taking advantage of the nice weather.
We chilled briefly in our room, then it was back down to the bar. This time we sat in the main bar area (rather than the informal sitting area surrounding it) and ordered a real meal. My food was phenomenal - a large, incredibly tender, simply-but-perfectly seasoned ribeye steak, plus basil mashed potatoes. As much as I enjoyed the food, I enjoyed the drinks more, and had more to drink than I really should have.
We then headed back to the room. Both of us had gotten more sun than we should have, but it didn't seem like either of us would have bad sunburns.
This was the first night we really noticed the mosquitoes. Our room didn't have air conditioning and it would heat up during the day, so we'd sleep with the patio doors open. But there were no screens to keep insects out. I don't know why the mosquitoes hadn't been as bad the first two nights, but they ate us alive this night.
Monday, 2018 April 16 Wednesday, 2018 April 18