Wednesday, 2018 April 25
Krista's ankle confirmed that postponing the Sagunto trip was a good idea. I was also starting to get a little cranky - as much as I was loving Spain, I was also really starting to feel like I needed to get back to doing something useful.
We had our usual breakfast, then headed back out towards the old town. Today Krista had her camera and I made her stop and take pictures of a tree that had been fascinating me since I first saw it.
We continued on our way to the central market. This time we were looking for scarves for Krista.
From there we walked a little more, then backtracked towards the old silk exchange. We had walked by here many times but never actually investigated. They offered an audio tour in English, so we purchased those and started the tour. It was quite interesting, and the building itself was breathtaking. The stonework in the old main room was unreal.
We decided it was time for a rest, so we stopped at a little shop next to the silk exchange and bought a couple drinks. We then sat down at what we thought was a common seating area in the alley, with table and chairs. After probably 20 minutes a waiter from a neighboring restaurant showed up to take our order; he seemed angry that we had bought stuff elsewhere, so he went into the shop and got into an argument with the shopkeeper. We decided that was a good time for us to leave.
Our next stop was the Valencia Cathedral, another spot we had walked by many times. This included a small museum. The cathedral itself was, in my opinion, not as impressive as the one in Cuenca.
Valencia has two well-known town gates remaining; we had seen one of them on our first full day there. Today we walked over to the other, Torres de Serranos.
From here we walked to the Museo de la Almoina (archaeological museum).
This was really cool - basically everything is underground, with walkways running over actual Roman archaeological excavations. Krista in particular was fascinated.
We stopped for a drink and a snack at Ness Restaurant; we sat outside, overlooking the small park next to Plaza de la Virgen. From here we walked to the Natural History Museum, which is located in Jardins del Real, a very nice park. It was a very pleasant walk; the museum itself had a variety of interesting exhibits.
From there we headed back towards El Corte Ingles - I was confident that today I'd finally be able to buy my souvenirs. We were both very hungry by this point so we stopped at another sidewalk cafe, Cafe de les Mones, overlooking the Parterre garden. We ordered some small plates; one dish, tiny shrimp cooked in a garlic sauce, served on bread, was particularly delicious.
Next we went to the "other" El Corte Ingles building, which did have housewares and books. I bought the two cookbooks I was looking for, plus three paella pans (two medium-sized ones for us and a larger one for our friends Adam and Alicia).
We decided to call it a day at this point and headed back to the hotel. It was a relatively strenuous walk for me, carrying three heavy paella pans.
I looked through the cookbooks when we got back. The first one, De Tapas, actually appeared unimpressive on my first pass. The other, Sabores de Siempre, looked phenomenal.
Tuesday, 2018 April 24 Thursday, 2018 April 26