clog blog: Tortosa, Tarragona and Valencia

After Bren and Kirsten’s 4 day stay with us in Rotterdam they moved onto Nuremberg in Germany while we had to face the last working week of the year. And what a long week it was! But we had our real Christmas tree to cheer us up and Christmas holidays to look forward to =)

Christmas Day dawned as gloomy as the previous week had been but relatively warm for the time of year, ~8ºC. We had a quiet day at home opening gifts, phoning family, and getting ready for our Spanish adventure!

We were invited to have Christmas dinner with a family we have become friendly with through Justin playing cricket and coaching, Annebo and Toon and their three children. Annebo's parents were there too and their neighbours. We asked what we can bring and were told something typically South African so we took along Christmas crackers complete with silly hats and fruit mince pies! (Fortunately for us these things are also quite English so we were able to locate them at the big Waterstones book store in Amsterdam). We had a lovely evening making friends, drinking good wine, enjoying good food and improving our Dutch! Thank you for including us in your Christmas celebrations Verhoeven's! We had a great time =)

Christmas dinner was great but the alarm going off at 04:30 on Boxing Day was not! Note to self: do not book a 7:00 flight on Boxing Day again!! At least we had booked a taxi and didn't have to mission with trams and buses and in the end we were easily on time.

And then it was time for some Spanish sunshine! Hooray! Although not super toasty, when standing in the sun you can warm up quite nicely. We landed in Barcelona, picked up our rental car and drove South about 200 km to Tortosa for three nights in a real Spanish castle! Justin had booked it as a surprise for Bron and surprised she was! Think functional defendable castle rather than fairytale Scottish-type castle but very nice all the same. Tortosa itself looked a bit dodgy when we drove through so we were super glad to be safely perched up on the hill which also gave awesome views over the city and surrounds.

The Castle that we stayed in overlooking the town of Tortosa

The view from the Castle walls

The plan for our Spanish holiday was 5 days on our own, 6 days with Bren and Kirsten and another 2 days on our own. Normally when we travel we try to see as much possible but this time the main aim was to chill and relax after a busy year! And of course try be outdoors and soak up as much sun as possible. It was quite a restful holiday but was also pretty busy at times too!

The first afternoon in Tortosa we explored the ruins of the castle grounds and old city walls and ventured into the city a bit, avoiding seedy looking alleys, only to find the Cathedral closed. The rest of the evening was spent chilling and drinking tea in the guest lounge =) We were quite spoilt with all the yummy dinners in the hotel's restaurant, even if dinner is only served from 8pm. Breakfast was an impressive buffet of local fair which we enjoyed in the morning sunshine overlooking the valley. Too much of bliss!

Some street scenes from Tortosa:

The first day in Tortosa we explored the nature reserve of Delta de L'Ebre. This peninsula region of Southern Catalonia is a prosperous rice growing region and wildlife haven. It was a bit different to what we expected from a national park (no entrance fee and almost no signage) but we managed to find a place to park and go for a walk among the reeds where several look out hides had been placed for bird watching. We only saw a flock of flamingos but believe that this area is rich in bird life. We also found a beach hut cafe type place that must be very vibey in the summer where Justin had his first paella complete with squid ink and unidentifiable sea creatures. Bron was feeling less adventurous and went for the safe option of a plate of chips. After lunch we had a lovely long walk on the beach enjoying the almost forgotten feeling of the sand beneath our feet and between our toes. Spain in the winter is just awesome!

Delta de l'Ebre:

The next day we went back in the direction of Barcelona to the town of Tarragona. Tarragona was an important Roman city in 3rd century BC and still has its original Roman aqueduct and amphitheatre. We enjoyed wondering around the ancient Roman part of the city and the views of the coast from the top of Nova Rambla and from the amphitheatre. After a lunch of croissants filled with the Spanish favourite, Iberican ham, it was time for some serious R&R at Aquum. A day spa attached to a hotel in Tarragona, Aquum has several cold, warm and hot pools with various water features and jets for a day of relaxing. We had a lovely relaxing afternoon floating in the warm water massaging ourselves with jets of water. So much of laziness!

Tarragonna:

2000 year old Roman Aqueduct (Pont de les Ferreres)

2nd Century AD Roman Amphiteatre

View of Tarragonna Cathedral

Old city centre

Enjoying an Iberian ham sandwich for lunch

A steel jungle just outside Tarragona (near Aquum)

The next day we headed further South to Valencia. Our hotel in Valencia overlooked the City of Arts and Sciences with its funky modern architecture and one of the craziest traffic circles we have ever seen! Driving in Spanish cities is an experience with a maze of one way streets and massive 6 lane circles at almost every intersection. Road rules are almost non-existent in these circles and one has to keep an eye on both neighbours at all times! People criss-cross all over the circle, you can exit the circle from the most centre lane and keep going round in the most outer lane. Too crazy! At breakfast one morning we took pity on a learner driver trying to negotiate the circle during a driving lesson.

The first afternoon in Valencia we left the car behind and caught a bus into the city. We survived the crazy circle and began exploring! We had a great afternoon wandering around the city soaking up the sunshine and enjoying the sights. We saw most of the main sights including the Cathedral and climbing up the bell tower, the Plaza de La Virgen, Plaza Manises, Mercado Central of central market where you can buy fresh produce everyday, Torres de Quart and Torres de Serranos. This was the warmest day of our trip and despite the wind it was great wandering around in the sunshine. There is also about an hour extra sunlight in Spain in the winter which really helps to beat the winter blues!

Valencia:

Looking down from the top of the Cathedral

Meats for sale in the Historic Central Market (Mercado Central)

Bron at the Torres de Quart

Flags on the Torres de Quart

Stairs at the Torres de Quart

Plaza de la Virgen.

The Turia fountain and the Cathedral in the background

Torres de Serranos

One of two remaining city gates from the 14th century

The restaurant of our hotel only opened at 20:30 (!) for dinner so we decided to eat in the city and discovered our new favourite thing: pinchos! Basically tapas on a stick, pinchos are found in almost all of the many tapas bars dotted around the city. How it works is grab a plate near the bar and help yourself, you touch it and it is yours. The barman will serve you drinks, sangria for Bron and a beer for Justin, and happily munch away! Keep all the sticks (mostly toothpicks) and pay per piece at the end. A great way to try lots of different local foods in one meal and actually quite economical too. Most of the times though you don’t know what you are choosing to eat before you bite it! Often we are pleasantly surprised at the complexity of a single tapas and the great mix of flavours and textures that you wouldn’t have guessed just looking at it on the plate. We had many pinchos meals over the next few days and sitting at the bar counter right under all the colourful platters was our favourite spot =)

Pinchos: tapas on a stick!

The next day we decided to explore the oceanarium at the City of Arts and Sciences. Close enough to walk from our hotel, we wandered over and enjoyed the funky modern architecture of the City of Arts and Sciences buildings on the way to the oceanarium. The City of Arts and Sciences is made up of 5 buildings and consists of a concert hall, an IMAX theatre and planetarium designed to look like a blinking eye, a science museum, a car park with steel arches, and the oceanarium. Our favourites at the oceanarium was the dolphin show, the chubby seals that reminded us of the V&A Waterfront, the pair of Beluga whales, and the enclosed tank that you can walk through.

City of Arts and Sciences:

Principe Felipe Science Museum

The Agora concert hall

Hemisferic (IMAX theatre and planetarium, foreground) and the Palau de les Arts

Hemisferic, the Principe Felipe Science Museum and the Agora

(left to right)

Hemisferic

Walking under a fish tank inside the Oceanografic

The Umbracle

The gardens in the Umbracle

In the evening we headed back into the city for our fix of pincho’s and sangria. Unbeknown to us there was a massive annual fun run on the go. Only in Spain in the middle of winter! The atmosphere in the city was very vibey and jovial but most of the streets were also closed which meant the busses weren’t running their normal routes. It was quite fun (not) working out where to catch the bus back from especially since English is not very big in Spain, even in the big cities. Funnily, all signs and products etc. come in two languages, Spanish and Catalonian!

The next day was New Year’s Eve and our last full day in Valencia. We decided to make the most of the sunshine with a long walk on the beach including a look at the yacht basin. Was so nice to have another walk on the beach and in the sun! The next day we had to be back in Barcelona, a 4 hour drive away, by 11:00. So it was a quiet night of bag packing and early to bed. We did however get our 12 grapes for the midnight countdown; the hotel gave out bags of grapes to all the guests. The tradition in Spain is that if you can eat all 12 grapes by the time the clock strikes 12, one for each strike, then you will have good luck in the New Year. This is much harder than it sounds and after two New Year’s in Spain we still didn’t get it right!

Another early alarm clock had us out of bed, checked out and on the road to Barcelona by 06:45. We were in good time to drop off our car and meet Bren and Kirsten at the airport in Barcelona.

More on our time with B&K in Barcelona and Madrid next time!

It has already been a week since we have been back in the Netherlands and back at work. Not much to say except that it is getting colder and we are both sick! The first half of the week was still an acceptable 8ºC or so but by Friday the temperatures had dropped to a max of between 0ºC and -2ºC. Snow is currently forecast for Tuesday with temperatures dropping further and remaining so for at least the next week. Fun times. We don’t mind the snow itself so much but the trains almost come to a standstill when one snowflake falls which they milk for as long as possible which becomes extremely annoying in the daily commute to work. Bron picked up a cold in Spain and has kindly shared it with Justin. So at the moment there are two code green Sheldon Coopers in the house. The weekend was spent indoors on the couch watching the 4 Ice Age movies box set =)

Hope you are all well and having a good start to the New Year! Wishing everyone the best for 2013. We hope to have many more travel adventures this year =)

‘till next time!

and some Christmas pics: