Founded in the year 137 BC Valencia (in latin "Strength") is the third biggest city in Spain.
Valencia - Comunidad Valenciana - Spain
Valencia - hospitable city
When Valencia’s stylish mayor Rita Barbera announced her city’s
successful bid to host the 2007 America’s Cup, she looked like the cat
that had not only gotten her cream but the entire diary. And rightly
so. The coup has done much for the self-esteem of Spain ’s ‘third’ city
and been hailed as a rare example of team effort between city, state
and central governments. One and a half billion euros have been spent
on a new marina as well as a bigger airport and high-speed train link
to the capital. Also, on 10 May 2007, Bernie Ecclestone announced that
Valencia will be the host of an urban circuit of F1, beginning in 2008,
and on 1st June 2007 the contract was signed in the F1 headquarters.
General information on Valencia
Founded in 137 BC, Valencia , meaning Strenght in Latin, is now the
third largest city in Spain. Located at the Costa Blanca, the city has
been occupied by the Visigoths, Moors and the Aragonese. During the
Spanish Civil War, the capital of the Republic was moved to Valencia.
During the Franco years, speaking or teaching Valencian was prohibited
(in a significant reversal it is now compulsory for every child
studying in Valencia).Valencia has enjoyed strong economic growth over
the last decade, much of it spurred by Costa Blanca tourism and the
construction industry.Valencia’s surrounding area has the highest rural
density in Europe. Hundreds of thousands of agrarian workers are needed
to toil the region’s rich and expansive huerta; a word that can only be
(inadequately) translated into English as vegetable patch or crop.It is
said that the Moors first introduced rice to Spain and just to the
south of Valencia, on the Orange Blossom Coastlines the Albufera, a
huge lagoon covered in rice paddies.Valencia’s port is one of the
busiest on the Mediterranean coast and the first of Spain, handling 20%
of Spain’s exports.
Sights & Things to do in Valencia
Less full of itself than Barcelona or even Madrid, Valencia still
retains old school touches. Retro billboards dot the city centre, moist
legs of hams hang from restaurant and shopkeepers in the old quarter do
a brisk trade in fans and embroidered mantillas (shawls) that are
sported by the local ladies on any Sunday morning. Politically
conservative, Valencianos let loose in their fiestas, particularly
frenzied even by Spanish standards.The most famous is Las Fallas in
mid-March, a weekend long event of fiery revelry where niñots – huge
effigies of political and social personages – are torched in the main
square.
La Tomatina, an annual tomato fight, draws crowds to
the nearby town of Buñol in August. There are also a number of well
preserved Catholic fiestas throughout the year. Semana Santa
celebrations in Valencia are considered the most colourful in Spain. In
the centre, the old quarter of Valencia is small enough to see in a
day. Make a beeline for the Mercado Central, an ornate Art Nouveau
affair that proudly displays Valencia’s rich bounty.Across the road is
the high Gothic Llonja de la Seda (Silk Exchange) – its soaring
candy-cane twisted columns were prime inspiration for a young
Calatrava. 
Within a stone’s throw is the city’s cathedral – a hotchpotch of
edifices from the Romanesque to the Baroque. The rather macabre
shrunken arm of Sant Vincent is its main attraction. More earthly
pleasures can be found in the dozens of restaurants and bars in the old
city of Valencia, not to mention small, specialist shops that make a
ceremony out of selling you a reel of cotton.The Eixample is where the
cashed-up merchants of the 18th century built their show homes.Although
the area lacks the work of the architectural luminaries of Barcelona,
there are some exceptions. The Palacio de Marqués de Dos Aguas (now
Valencia’s Ceramic Museum) is an over-the-top extravaganza featuring a
breathtaking alabaster portal that curves around the main entrance.Even
before the America’s Cup the city has always been disposed to sudden
bouts of dramatic urban change. Prone to flooding, the Río Turía that
surrounds the city was diverted in 1957 and now its dry bed sports
miles of football pitches and leafy gardens.World-renown Valencian
architect Santiago Calatrava’s swaggering, white museum complex, the
Ciudad de las Artes and las Ciencias, was a push to draw tourists to a
once-neglected area of industrial wasteland towards the coastline
Museums in Valencia
- Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias Arts and Sciences Museum
- Instituto Valenciano De Arte Moderno Valician Modern Art Institute
- Museo De Bellas Artes Fine Arts Museum
- Museo de Prehistoria de Valencia
- Museo Fallero & Museo Del Artista Fallero (Fallas Museum)
- Museo Taurino (Bullfighting Museum)
- Museo Del Arroz (Rice Museum)
- Museo Fallero & Museo Del Artista Fallero (Fallas Museum)
- Museo Valenciano de la ilustración y la Modernidad (MUVIM)
- Almudín ( expositions variées, principalement art et archéologie)
- Museo de Semana Santa (Holy Week Museum)
- Museum of Corpus (Musée du Corpus)
- Ceramica Museum
- Museum of Valencian History
- Museum of Alfonso Pascual Maldonado
Nightlife in Valencia
Valencia’s hot days lead to long, languid nights. In the 1980s and
1990s, the Carmen neighbourhood in the old city was where the club kids
headed to hear bacalao, an early version of Balearic beat dance
music.Today, the more alternative/bohemian bars and nightclubs are
concentrated in the Carmen, while the student nightlife is found around
Blasco Ibanez and the more mainstream weekend nightlife has its
clusters in the areas of Canovas and Juan Llorens. In the summer there
is also nightlife on the beach and at the Port and Malvarossa
Beach.Since the America's Cup has taken place at Valencia, new clubs
have been opened and people from all nations go there to party every
weekend. As is normal for Spain, nightlife does not take off until well
after midnight. Agua de Valencia is the city's unofficial cocktail.
Cuisine of Valencia
Valencia is famous due to its wonderful gastronomic culture. Paella,
horchata, fartons, potatoe omellete, rosquilletas, iced lemon, squids,
are some of the examples of food in Valencia. Have a meal of paella
washed down with an Agua de Valencia (orange juice and sparkling wine)
and you are partaking in the two main reasons for the city’s economic
success: orange and rice.The Eixample is also the place where the
well-heeled shop and eat at big-name boutiques and formal restaurants
with moustached waiters expert in restrained formality.More relaxed
dining can be found at Valencia’s beach Malvarrosa. Although it’s a tad
run-down, the shoreline is flanked by traditional fish joints that are
thronged on the weekend for Sunday paella. The best is La Pepica, an
institution that was yet another haunt of Hemingway. Bathed in the
prettiest blue tiles with a glass, sea-facing façade, the excellent
rice and fish dishes are despatched from an open kitchen at lightening
speed to hundreds of hungry customers.Just behind Malvarrosa is the
neighbourhood of Cabanyal, with rows of colourful tile-clad houses and
dimly-lit tapas bars serving up sardines and mussels.
When in Valencia...
When you are spending your vacation in a holiday home at the Costa Blanca, we recommend spending a day in Valencia.
Valencia is about a 60 miles from Javea and Benitachell , 78 miles from Altea , 66 miles from Moraira , Benissa and Calpe and 54 miles from Denia
Please note that most shops are closed during siesta hours (between
14:00 and 16:30). The more reason for you to explore and enjoy the
local gastronomy.
The climate of Valencia
Valencia has a Mediterranean climate, with warm dry summers and mild winters
Pull
up a chair on a shaded terrace, order an Agua de Valencia and observe
the city’s unique cocktail where even the young folk are not adverse to
donning traditional garb for the family stroll. Unlike many modern
Spanish cities, Valencianos are staunch sticklers for tradition. And
therein, at least for the moment lies its charm.