Spain Day Three: Road Trip to Magic Mountain

We had pre-reserved a rental car through Europcar, and planned to pick it up at the Barcelona Sants train station, because that was closer to our hotel than the airport. We took a cab to the station, easily found the rental counter and received our car. I was a bit worried that the pink monster wouldn’t fit in a tiny Euopean rental car, but the VW Golf handled it just fine.

That's the pink monster, glowing in the back!

And…we were off! Using Google Maps GPS, we headed for Valencia. Because there is a Valencia, CA very close to us at home – and it is the location of Six Flags Magic Mountain – we kept joking that we were driving to Magic Mountain. Along the way, I introduced Adam to the wonders of gas station food in Europe. We stopped at a rest stop that had a full barista-staffed coffee bar, a fresh salad bar, freshly squeezed juices, hot handmade pizzas and sandwiches, etc. Seriously, if gas stations were like this in the US, I would actually spend more time (and money) there!

At the gas station, we saw a Lamborghini with rally race stickers on the side, and noted that it would most certainly go blowing by us back on the Autopista. It never did, but a few miles down the road, we found ourselves in the middle of the rally! A Porsche Panamera, F-Type Jaguar and Mercedes AMG GT with the same stickers all flew past. Sweet!

The drive was an easy three hours. I told Adam that kilometers go by much faster than miles. We both laughed. I know that’s because they are smaller – duh! But it’s true! It makes a trip feel faster!

When driving in Europe, finding a hotel and parking is always the most stressful part. We pulled into Valencia and found our hotel, but couldn’t figure out where to park to unload. Finally, we just pulled over, dumped the bags, and I stayed with them while Adam drove 4 blocks to the parking garage.

 

Our hotel

Our hotel was amazing!  It was the One Shot Reina Victoria, which was the first ever hotel in Valencia, built in 1913. I didn’t even know this when booking! I never read reviews when making reservations because people are crazy. I book purely on photos. If a place looks cool, I’m in. Turns out Hemingway stayed at this hotel while writing The Sun Also Rises in 1925. Faithful blog readers will know that I accidentally follow Hemingway everywhere he goes. Without planning to, I went all the places he did in Key West, Paris, Cuba, and now Valencia! It is like we are travel soul mates separated by a century.

I loved Valencia. There isn’t a major landmark, so there weren’t many tourists. But for me, the attraction was the city itself. It is full of clean white baroque and colorful art deco buildings. Compared to Barcelona it felt more graceful – softer and brighter. Orange trees line the streets.

We walked around, taking photos and shopping. Adam scored a great vintage poster in an old dusty book store for $5. I stopped at a place called Zumm Salads to grab a quick sandwich and had the best turkey/cheese/green apple sandwich I have ever had. I also wanted to try fresh OJ since Valencia is known for its oranges. OMG. Best orange juice EVER.

Valencia also has a section outside the historic quarter that is full of modern buildings. They are art museums, an oceanographic studies center, a zoo, and a few other things I don’t remember. It was such a nice, airy district – all centered around a huge park where locals run, ride bikes and picnic.

We returned to our historic hotel for showers, and headed out to dinner. We picked a place because it had my initials above the door (unrelated to the name of the restaurant, and we still don’t know why it was there). 

Beautiful blue glass bottle full of plain water; note the empty restaurant

We arrived at 7:30, but the kitchen didn’t open until 8 (of course), so we sat on the patio and had sangria. When we finished dinner at 9:45, people were just starting to fill up the restaurant. But we were exhausted so we said buenos noches to Valencia.

Tomorrow: Cartegena shows us the real Spain.

xoxo

Mediterranean Cruise Day Ten: “Oh-reeg-een-AHHHL-ay”

Entering the port of Messina at sunrise, with mainland Italy in the distance

Today would be our last port on this long 12-day cruise – Messina, Sicily. We met our group of six others at the coffee bar at 7:45 am and found our driver, Guiseppe (Joseph). We had pre-arranged for a tour of Castelmola, Taormina and Messina. We all got in the van, expecting an actual tour, but Joseph didn’t say a word the whole way to Castelmola, which was a one-hour drive. We all started asking questions, which he answered only with yes/no, and then eventually just started making up our own tour and giggling.

Castelmola is a beautiful town on the very top of the hill, overlooking the sea and Mount Etna, the largest volcano in Europe. It was tiny, but lovely. We climbed a ton of steps up to the castle ruins. 

Main square, Castelmola

When we came back down, Joseph had put out cannolis for us. While we ate pastries, I told him that my family was originally from Calabria. He asked where and I told him Longobucco, a village above Cosenza. He said “you are an oh-reeg-een-AHHHL-ay” (an original, from Italy). I explained that I was 5 generations removed from Italy, but that I had visited the village from which my great, great grandfather had come. From that point on, Joseph and I were best friends. He decided to give the tour – but only to me.

“Jennifer, try these fresh cherries.”

“Jennifer, do you want to see an amazing overlook of the sea below?”

“Jennifer, this church houses the bodies of WW2 soldiers and every Sunday they ring that bell to honor them.”

“Jennifer, go inside this church and look at the ceiling.”

The rest of the group was not amused.

That is Castelmola, way up in the top right corner, up on that peak. 

Taromina in the foreground.

Ancient Greek Theatre with Mt. Etna in the background

We went to Taormina and walked around independently for a few hours. We hiked to the top of the Greek Theatre, which was built in 300 BC. Adam said it was “constructed for ancient comedians Laurel and Harticus.”

View from our lunch table

Italian cat

We stopped for lunch in one of the narrow alleyways that wind up staircases above the village and had a pizza. Then we stopped for gelato in the main square. The banana gelato was fantastic. We ate it on our way back to Joseph’s van, while also window shopping.

Joseph took us to an overlook just outside Taromina, to see the beach resorts below. It was stunning!

Back in Messina, we stopped at the WW2 memorial church with it’s giant bell (Campana in Italian!) and had a great overview of our ship below.  Then we went to the Cathedral of Messina, built in the 1100s. Joseph was right – the ceiling was fantastic. He also told me that recently, a 14-year-old boy on a bike had been hit by a city garbage truck and died. There were still funeral flowers and candles lit inside from when the entire city came together to mourn the boy at the cathedral. So sad. I had to relay this information to the rest of the group, since Joseph only spoke to me.

We had an early back on board time, so we played both music trivia and general trivia on the ship. We came in second place both times. Second place is great though – because you still win yellow raffle tickets. We had no idea what would become of all our yellow tickets we had been stockpiling, but we were excited to redeem them on the final day of the cruise, which would be tomorrow.

We watched sail away on the lawn club, then went to dinner. That evening, we watched the Elysium show in the main theater. I usually avoid cruise ship theater productions like the plague. But this ship’s talent was actually very good. Especially the aerial acrobats! Adam even liked it, so that means it was REALLY good.

Later that night we went to the ‘70s disco party. The cruise director joked that it was for people 70 and older (because that was most of the ship). It was fun nonetheless. Even 70 year olds know the Y.M.C.A.!

Tomorrow: Last sea day as we head towards Spain

xoxo