Beaches, Valencia, Spain (March 2020)

Valencia faces the Mediterranian Sea and has several beaches with wide and beautiful golden sand beaches.

Kristin and I visited three of the most famous ones.

Malvarosa Beach
The most popular one is Malvarosa Beach. It has the best developed boardwalks and apparently many tourists visit this beach. We had a dinner at Restaurante Luz de Luna or Moon Light Restaurant. Our dinner was their Menu del Dia or Daily Menu available for lunch. The Menu del Dia included the first and second dishes, plus bread, a drink, including wine, a dessert. The total cost was 11.50 Euro. What a deal!

Las Arenas Beach
The most prestigious beach seems to be Las Arenas Beach. It was closest to the Marina and naturally, it attracts many people. Also, the restaurants were pretty closely located to the beach boardwalk, thus making it easy for people to pop in. We had ice cream and churros with hot chocolate.

By the beach was a hotel, named after the beach called Las Arenas Hotel, which is known to be quite expensive. It looked pretty exclusive just from the outer appearance.

I saw a sand artist who was building a sandcastle.

Patacona Beach
If the two beaches above are for tourists, Patacona Beach is for the locals. As we entered into the Patacona Beach, we could tell that the quality of the beach was not as good as the other two. But, many Valencians visit this beach, particularly for Paellas.

It was tranquil and relaxing to walk on the boardwalks of the beach. A big plus for Valencia.

Marina
Valencia hosted Port America's Cup twice in 2007 and again in 2009. America's Cup is a global yacht competition of which the origin dates back to 1851. The stable breeze in the sea is an ideal condition for the yacht competition.

Now the facilities built for the events have been sold to private companies for their own uses as warehouses or so.

The pier stretched into the sea gave us a panoramic view of the beaches.

Port

Behind the Marina was the Port facilities. It accommodates the movement of a lot of cargos in and out of Spain. Its volume is the second in Spain and the fifth in Europe. - Jeffrey

General - Valencia, Spain (March 2020)

Kritin and I traveled from Madrid to Valencia by bus. It took about 4 and a half hours including a lunch break for 30 minutes. We stayed in Valencia for 10 days.

Spain consists of 17 autonomous communities. Valencia Community is one of them.

Valencia Community has three cities and Valencia is the capital of this community and the third-largest city in Spain, after Madrid and Barcelona. Madrid is in itself an autonomous community and the capital city of Spain. Its population is at 6.5 million and Barcelona is the capital of Catalonia with a population of 5.5 million. Valencia Community has 1.6 million inhabitants and the City of Valencia has approximately 850,000 in population.

We stayed at a one-bedroom loft in the area of Cabanyal through Airbnb. Cabanyal has access to a few famous beaches but used to be an independent town as a rough area with a lot of gypsies living under the dictator Franco's rule. With tourists coming to the beaches and the expats settling down in the area, Cabanyal has been developing. Now it is a part of Valencia City.

Overall, I found Valencia to be a very livable city. People are friendly; the streets are clean; the public transportation is diverse and well developed; the cost of living seems reasonable; the climate seems mild. It has beaches, museums, parks and gardens, and many cultural attractions.

The best time of the year in climate is said to be March, April, and November, December. But, even in the summer, the temperature hovers around 25 degrees C thanks to sea breezes.

Valencia has seven public universities, including the University of Valencia, and 25 private universities. Reportedly, students come to Valencia not necessarily because of academic quality but because of attractive nightlife.

Kristin and I took a Tuk Tuk Tour Valencia for two hours on the next day after we arrived in Valencia. The tour guide and driver was Tommy, who is originally from Rome but lived in various countries, including Australia, San Diego USA, Brazil, Mexico, now living in Valencia for three years. He was quite an interesting guy!

We usually take a Hop-on Hop-off bus tour to browse a city, but this time, we took the Tuk Tuk because the Hop-on Hop-off bus tour was rated very poor. the Tuk Tuk Tour service was pretty convenient. Apparently, Tuk Tuk Tour is fairly new to Valencia. There are only 10 Tuk Tuks in Valencia and Tommy's company owns six. It was a great way to experience the city with a lot of flexibility and practical convenience of stopping wherever we wanted. The Tuk Tuk we rode was bigger than what we were used to. Tommy explained that it takes 8 hours to charge this electric vehicle and it can run for 3 days.

Valencia has a well developed public transportation system, including metro, tram, buses and taxis. Also, there are extensive networks of bike routes. We took the buses quite often to travel around the city. It cost us 1.50 Euro for each ride.

Based on the tour, we took our own independent trips to different parts of the city. I have broken our Valencia trip into:

• General, 
• Beaches, 
• Historic Center, 
• City of Arts and Sciences, 
• Foods and 
• Fallas. 

I am still not doing the video blog yet. But I have found a vlog that shows snapshots of beautiful Valencia and if you are interested, Click here to watch a short video about Valencia

Enjoy Valencia! - Jeffrey

Madrid, Spain (February 2020)

Kristin and I planned to spend a month in Spain in March 2020 and during this time make a few trips to the neighboring countries: i.e. Malta and Tunisia. Previously, we did a tour to various cities in Spain and Portugal, but there were a few Mediterranian cities we did not cover, including Valencia and Malaga.

We started in Madrid, Spain's capital city, and planned to continue to Valencia, Malta, Tunisia, a road trip to Malaga and two weeks in Malaga. But, new coronavirus outbreak was getting worse in February and March 2020, and we decided to surrender the entire travel schedule to God's sovereignty and keep our attitude flexible to His guidance.

My planned visit to the first city Madrid was made after my visit to Tbilisi Georgia, but this trip to Madrid had a few twists.

The first was the hick-up with TAROM airline via Vayama.com as reported earlier in the Georgia travel blog. I found out that there was no flight from Tbilisi to Madrid during the winter. As a result, my arrival in Madrid was delayed by one day.

The second twist came one day before my scheduled departure date to Madrid. Initially, I was supposed to stay at Danny Kim's house. One day before I arrived, I checked with him and he confirmed. Soon after the confirmation, however, he told me that a TV station decided to make a documentary of his family life and the filming was taking place at his house with his wife while I was visiting. Danny's wife Nikaela forgot about my planned stay and scheduled for the filming with the TV during my visit. So in a nutshell, I could not stay at his house. Fortunately, I was able to find a hotel at the last minute, not too far from his house nor too far from the airport, using Chase points.

The filming was about Nikaela's contrasting speed of life with her Ambulance doctor role and the mom who needs to slow down in taking care of her child who has Down syndrome. It was encouraging to see that the TV station was interested in making the documentary.

The third twist came on Sunday when Kristin was supposed to arrive at 1:10om. After her arrival, we were supposed to travel to Valencia together by an express train. But, she doze off at a lounge in Bangkok and missed the Qatar flight to Madrid via Doha. It was after midnight and I could understand that it could happen. Thus, we ended up staying one night in Madrid before we traveled to Valencia on Monday, not by train but by bus because the train tickets were all sold out while I was having breakfast. Oh boy...

When I arrived, Danny came to pick me up at the airport. He dropped me off at Hotel Dome Madrid. This hotel lobby was decorated with actual cars that must have been used for the auto racing, except the Rolls Royce. Other cars displayed were Alfa Romeo, Ferreri, Lamborghini, and Porche.

Also, the floor where I stayed in the hotel had a wall photo that was quite impressive.

On Friday, I invited Danny's family to a Korean restaurant for lunch because the kids were not going to school.

Afterward, Danny and I spent some time at his house to discuss how he may serve with SfK Ministries. Our conversation was cordial. On Saturday, I left him alone so the he may spend time with his family.

On Sunday, I attended a Hillsong worship service with Danny's family. I took it easy at the hotel after the worship service. Since I learned that Kristin would arrive late in the evening, I had to make a reservation for another night at the same hotel and also purchased the bus tickets online.

On Monday, Danny came to pick us up at the hotel and dropped us off at the Estacion Sur de Autobuses. Danny came with his entire family and Kris enjoyed a brief moment with Isaac.

A lovely family! - Jeffrey