Valencia; Sunday, 20 January, 2019

A relatively late breakfast and then out of the hotel and over towards the other remaining city tower the Torres de Quart. Sadly, despite it having been due to open at 10am, by the time I arrived a little before 11 it was still all locked up and showed no sign of being open any time soon. So instead I headed on down the road to the Jardí Botanic – the University’s botanical gardens – and had a long wander around them, popping in and out of the greenhouses with each small belt of drizzle passing over. Just behind the Jardí Botanic are the Jardín de Las Hespérides which is a public garden with a large open space and a number of hedges and orange trees. It looked like a relatively nice place, but at that moment another drizzly shower attempted to start.

My plan for the day (which was already faltering following the tower being closed) was to have lunch and then visit the Cathedral when it opened to tourists in the afternoon, but it was still quite early, so instead I caught the metro and then the tram out to the beach at Playa de la Malvarrosa, though the look of the sea indicated that paddling wasn’t an option. I had hoped to find a decent restaurant open on the sea front, but most appeared to be spending January being renovated, so the only open one was completely full.

Instead I headed back into the city centre and grabbed a quick bite near the cathedral waiting for it to open. The cathedral was due to open at 2pm, and by the time I’d finished lunch it was almost 3, so I assumed the Cathedral would be available to look around. For the second time in the same day I found a site completely locked up and with no sign that it was just about to open. So instead, I turned to the backup plan and walked up to the main road on the edge of the old town to pick up the bus out to the Oceanogràfic – the city’s aquarium and reportedly the largest such in Europe.

It was a very impressive aquarium, located over a number of buildings all connected either above or below ground, with several walk through tanks and a large number of species. I spent a long time looking round and found myself down by the dolphin enclosure about 10 minutes before the last show of the day was due to take place.

I felt a little conflicted about visiting the show, and wasn’t quite certain why the aquarium had them, as a lot of their exhibits were clearly around taking care of the seas and working with nature – and yet here they were training dolphins to perform tricks. I can’t say I was particularly impressed with the show, and it’s difficult to see why the aquarium still puts it on given its stark contrast to the rest of their very commendable work and educational message.

When I’d arrived I’d assumed that I would be round and out in a couple of hours, but in the end I had to virtually dash round the last couple of exhibitions to see everything before the park shut for the night, though being there at dusk as the chorus from the aviary got up to full cry, and the sun beautifully illuminated the stunning building, was worth staying for in itself.

I headed out of the park to see a massive queue for the next bus back in towards the city centre. Thankfully, due to taking the open top bus on the Friday, I was aware there was another bus stop about 200m further back up the road, before the aquarium, which was totally deserted when I got there. Consequently I had a nice comfy seat whilst a lot of other people were crammed in.

It was almost dark as we headed in and I realised the bus was going to stop at the bus stop at the end of the Pont del Serrans. Thankfully lots of other people appeared to have had the same idea as me and the bus emptied here as we all headed over to the bridge to take in the bridge, river bed and Torres de Serranos all floodlit.

I walked back through the old town, and was interested to find that the cathedral was now open – it looked like a mass was just finishing – so I headed inside for a quick look around before they started to close it down for the night.

The Cathedral finally completed, I was just in time to pick up the last tour bus of the night for a tour of the city – which had the advantage of filling the time until dinner would be served, so I took in the sites one last time before returning to the city centre and having another good dinner, then headed back to my hotel to pack.