[Mariam]: A vacation is not a vacation if the ocean is not involved. [Henry]: I like to think that good food is more important. [Mariam]: 🙄. Thankfully, it’s easy to combine these two in Valencia. Right by Playa Malvarrosa there are countless restaurants offering fresh and authentic paellas. So yay 😀!
With this, we headed to the beach on day 4 of our trip. The plan: to have a relaxed time. It happened to be the hottest day of our trip, so this could not have been a better decision.
Playa Malvarrosa is just beautiful. A long sandy beach with peaceful water. Just what we needed. It was much longer that what we expected actually (it takes about 45 min to walk from one end to the other) and so there were plenty of choices of where to camp. We opted to stay close to where we’d be eating lunch: La Paz (by far the best paella we’ve ever had). We won’t tell you much about our lunch at la Paz because it was so so so soooo delicious; instead we are dedicating a whole post for it, so stay tuned for that!
What we did on the beach:
- Swim (duh!);
- Sleep under palmed shade;
- Buy coconuts from beach vendors and devour them;
- Run on the hot sand (that’s just for Henry, Mariam chose to sleep more); and
- Walk along the water
We basically spent about 8 hours just doing that. Eventually, when it started getting less warm, we decided to walk towards the marina and see what the rest of the beach had to offer. To our big surprise there was a huge beer festival going on. [Henry]: I can’t believe we almost missed this! Quite the perfect place for a beer fest: Excellent weather for beer and beautiful scenery. Wish we had this in Montreal!
We continued touring the area and saw more interesting spots: Children’s parks (complete with multiple trampolines), a skate boarding area, markets, restaurants and bars, boat renting stations, and our favorite: Ice-cream shops. There was quite a lot to see and to do. Definitely worth staying more than just a day or two.
For dinner, we went to Casa Montana, one of the oldest and most authentic tapas bars in the area. It dates back to 1836. We actually had to reserve a week in advance to get a table. The decor, the food, the staff were all amazing. We opted for their original menu (what they served in 1836) and were quite happy with the quality of the food. Just look at the menu and tell us your mouth is not watering right now 😀:
After this amazing dinner, we thought it would be wise to walk off all the calories we absorbed (at least some of them). So we walked around the neighbourhood and found some charming streets and homes. This area of Valencia is not frequented by tourists much because it sadly has a bad reputation. Some say it’s dangerous, others say it’s ugly, and some say it’s very poor. Though we could tell it was very different from the city center or other parts of Valencia, we did not feel unsafe at all, and we definitely found it quite charming. See for yourself and tell us what you think:
Have you been to Valencia? Are you from Valencia? Let us know what you thought/think of it. For us, it has been an unforgettable trip and we know for sure that we’ll be back. [Mariam]: Maybe, we’ll even move here. [Henry]: Wait, what?Â
From Point A 2 Point B 
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