Valencia, Oh Valencia!
After a riveting four and a half hour drive from Palamos to Valencia, broken up by a stop at an awful beach with enticing names (Playa de Conxa, and Play d'Oro), we arrived to rush hour traffic. Our wire for charging the GPS in the car has broken, and we don't know where to go, AND we don't have a place to stay. We drive around a bit looking for an internet cafe. Carmen says she see one, but when we go round the block and return, it turns out to be a dry cleaners. Suddenly I realize there's WIFI everywhere as my iTouch always seems to be drawing a map of our exact location (hello?). I park the car and stand on a street corner tilting the iTouch in different directions, pacing back and forth to find the strongest signal for an open, unsecure connection that's somewhere around..... Half an hour passes and the boys are going ballistic on the sidewalk, doing their best to create havoc for all asunder. As I'm making a booking on wotif, getting directions using google maps, Ethan claws at my leg and tried to drag me into oncoming traffic. Toby runs up and down yelling and getting in the way of cyclists and pedestrians. It's all too much, and the connection slow, so we decide to drive closer to a possible hotel and try from there.
We jump in the car, using the iTouch to guide us the ten minutes through the city. Somehow it manages to update us on our position continuously as we go, even though I have no phone connection. I didn't put in the exact address however, so it's somewhere on a long block and not so obvious. Luckily there is a playground which Carmen takes the boys too, lends Ethan her watch to wear and he places it on the bench never to be seen again.
Meanwhile, I go off and find a cafe that claims to have internet connection. The waitress is hurried and won't take any nonsense from anybody. She hands me the password but doesn't know the router name, of which there are half a dozen. After several tries, I give up and go out into the street where I find a gushing stream of an unsecure, open internet connection, and within five minutes able to check my mail, update New York Times reader, make a hotel reservation on wotif and get the directions from my precise location to the hotel half, yes, half a block away(!).
The receptionist recommends a place to eat and we drive there at 8:30 to find it's just opening as we get there, and of course it's also empty. It's quite expensive, so we walk along and find plenty of other likely possibilities including a tempting Japanese restaurant. There are tables and chairs set outside restaurants, with terraces and people eating delicious looking tapas. Everybody seems smartly dressed although none wearing jackets or sweaters because it's still quite warm. We find a place called Sa Fonda with seats inside, and fairly inexpensive. The tapas we order turn out to be some of the best food I've had in years, especially the pork dishes. I can't believe the flavours I'm tasting and make a lot of exclamation noises, even though I have a cold which is probably muting a lot of the flavour. The boys enjoy the fideua noodles, and the ice cream that follow: one called Dracula that had vinegar at the bottom of the glass. It actually tasted good.
Next, we headed to the Palace of Fine Arts to walk off the meal. I had seen a documentary about the aquarium and remember that it was an impressive building. When we saw all the various buildings, none of us could believe it. The buildings and bridge are incredibly futuristic and are lite in a brilliant white to contrast against the dark Valencian sky. We parked the car and ummed and aaghed our way around the Palace of Fine Arts and Science Museum. It was very memorable evening for all of us, and totally unexpected.