Valencia

L’Umbracle in the City of Arts and Sciences

Over the past few weeks my life has been overtaken by reading, doing group projects, polishing my CV and attending a ton of networking and career events. I though I couldn’t let this craziness overpower me too early in the process, so I decided to go on a quick weekend trip to Valencia. I’ve heard a lot of wonderful things about Valencia but I didn’t research much before. I went with the flow. The city is located in the middle of the east coast and is the third largest city in Spain. That of course was a great opportunity to catch the last summer rays of sun on one of the city beaches, which we did as the weather was gorgeous. In the evening, before embarking on a long night of dancing till the early hours, we wandered around through the maze of narrow, romantic streets of the old town. It wouldn’t be a proper trip if I didn’t try paella which I mentioned in my last post. I found a restaurant which seemed to be a great choice according to the reviews. Despite the charm and the atmosphere of the place, the food was not as good as expected and left me a bit disappointed. Oh well…believe it or not, after eating out so much I am convinced that Spanish cuisine is just ok…shocker!

The next day a group of us went to the City of Arts and Sciences which blew me away. It is an architectural complex designed by world renowned Spanish architects – Santiago Calatrava and Felix Candela. The complex is made up of 7 modern buildings which host a planetarium, oceanarium, a museum of science, an opera house and an art gallery. What is interesting is that some of the structures, which are located by the Turia river, are designed in a way to resemble an eye of knowledge, a skeleton of fish, and a water lily. The rest of the day was spent in oceanarium, which is in fact the biggest oceanarium in Europe, and sightseeing the city center. I highly recommend this city to anyone who wants to check out Spain. You cannot miss Valencia!