Valencia

As we pulled into Valencia we were slightly concerned with the heat that we were about to encounter.

There are signs all over Spanish cities telling you the temperature, we saw signs of 35+ degrees! We had the orientation walk of the city with Delia our guide and then had a short siesta.

We met up with Robbie and Maureen at 6:30 pm to go for a walk down through the "river" (a dammed river bed which is now a series of parks, gardens and walking tracks) which runs along the city. Our destination was the City of Arts and Sciences which we thought was a 1 hr walk. 2 hrs later we got there, the difference in timings were due to us underestimating the distance but also underestimating the number of photos Damo and Robbie would take (and the heat).

Along the river we saw families at play, a massive kids play area where they could climb over a 'Gulliver's travels' giant tired to the ground, lots of joggers, and even a medieval game (similar to dodge ball, but players had weapons such as ball on chains and big sticks).

The City of Arts and Sciences was spectacular and unlike anything else we had seen in Spain. The modern architecture is probably not too everyone's taste, but it's definitely an amazing area to see.

Given it was 8:30 pm and we hadn't eaten dinner we headed back to the hotel, the heat snuck up on us as although it was so late, it was still a stinker! We had to stop for beers along the way to rest and rehydrate. Dinner was at a small bar which was full of young locals. We worked out that it was so popular as the beers and food were super cheap (but still good quality). Given Damo is so good with languages he has been the designated 'food orderer' for the majority of the trip. However tonight Damo was ensuring that we all got to practice our Spanish, so Robbie and Mick we forced to try to converse with their non-English speaking bar staff. After much pointing and shaking of heads we were able to order. The barman told us the price and Robbie and Mick looked at each other, looked back at the barman, and then just fanned out all the euro notes they had and let him take however much we needed/wanted. Luckily he was an honest barman.

Anticipating the next day wad going to be another scorcher we made plans to go to Valencia's beach. It was a good call as the day turned out to be a 40 degree day. The sand was so hot that it burnt our feet and the water was so warm that it was like having a bath, it was the ideal place to be.

On the bus ride back, saw a sign saying that it was 43 degrees. As we passed the City of Arts and Sciences, Damo went up to Robbie and Maureen and said "I think we should all get off the bus here and walk back" (obviously Damo was joking). The look on Robbie's face was priceless! The stranger sitting next to Mick turned to him and said "I don't know what your friend said to her, but she does not look impressed at all!".

The group dinner was at a restaurant that served traditional paella, which we learnt contains no seafood (hooray) and had chicken and rabbit meat. It was slightly concerning that we couldn't really distinguish between the rabbit and chicken. Half the group headed out for drinks where Mick impressed everyone with his maths and geography skills. We had a cocktail pitcher that cost 15€ which was shared between 5 people. Mick worked our that each person had to pay 2.50€.....they all find it hard to believe that Mick works in a bank!

On the walk back to the hotel we were telling Delia about our Lonely Planet book on Spain which had a top 25 Spanish attractions, and how our trip was covering the vast majority of the 25. At that point Mick declared "I am amazed the Algarve (which we had visited while in PORTUGAL) did not make it into the top 25 Spanish attractions. Delia was dumb founded, and was probably wondering how the hell did the Australian banks survive the GFC when there are idiots like Mick working there!