Spain Guide
Valencia and Murcia
Valencia
Valencia is emerging as one of the nation's most progressive cities. Spain's third largest, it continues to reinvent itself at a heady pace, and is well on the way to equalling the cosmopolitan vitality of Barcelona and the cultural variety of Madrid. In the last decade or so, the vast, iconic Ciudad de las Artes y Ciencias – has emerged, a metro has opened and dozens of hip new bars, restaurants and boutiques have injected new life into the historic centre.
Despite its size and stylista cachet, Valencia retains an unpretentious if tangibly charged air. With low-cost airlines bussing in visitors by the planeload, tourism has also hit the city in a big way, and the ubiquitous English breakfast has become a fixture.
The most atmospheric area to explore is undoubtedly the maze-like streets of the Barrio del Carmen (in Valenciano "de Carmé"), roughly the area north of the Mercado Central to the Río Turia. This once-neglected quarter of the city continues to regenerate, making for an incredibly vibrant, alternative neighbourhood. The city walls were pulled down in 1871 to make way for a ring road, and the beautiful church of Santo Domingo, in Plaza de Tetuan, has been converted into the barracks from which that General Milans del Bosch ordered his tanks during the abortive coup of 1981.
The oldest part of the city is almost entirely encircled by a great loop of the Río Turia, now a landscaped riverbed park. The ancient stone bridges remain, but the riverbed now houses cycle ways, footpaths and football pitches, as well as the astonishing Ciudad de las Artes y Ciencias, Europe's largest cultural complex.
Valencia's main beach is the Playa de la Malvarrosa to the east of the city centre, which becomes Playa de las Arenas at its southern end.
The city has long boasted some of the best nightlife to be found in mainland Spain. Its fiestas are among the most riotous in Spain; Las Fallas, March 12–19, culminates in a massive bonfire where all the processional floats are burned.
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