Last weekend, Larry, our friend Bayard, and I went for a 5 day/4 night road trip adventure across Spain to Valencia, Alicante, and then back through Toledo. It was a trip of many "firsts": first time "CouchSurfing", first time walking in a Spanish bull-fighting arena, first time seeing fireworks that I thought would end the world......let's take this all from the beginning.
CouchSurfing: this website was created in 2004 as a world-wide, online hospitality service , with the objective of connecting travelers with locals who can offer lodging or hosting during their stay. Having heard about this new phenomenon over the past few years from friends who had tried it out, I remained skeptical of showing up to a stranger's house and sleeping on their couch! But when you're trying to travel on a budget, and traveling with two other guys (strength in numbers!), having a free place to stay for 3 nights can save you 180 euros combined, at least! Plus, when you really look into what CouchSurfing is all about, it's not as scary as it seems. From the members' profiles alone you can get a sense of what the people are like, and select those who don't appear to be sketch-balls, and seem to have things in common with you. Also, past surfers leave references and comments attesting to how their hosts were, so you can get a sense of what staying with a certain person would be like. Finally, once you get in contact with that person, emailing back and forth allows you to get to know one another at a basic level, so as not to feel like you're showing up to a complete stranger.
Our first 'Couch-Search' for Valencia lead us to Elodie and Manu, a Belgian girl and Valencian guy who had rave reviews from their past surfers, and were willing to accommodate three visitors. They lived just outside the city, and seemed cool. So we met them upon our arrival in Valencia Friday evening, and their hippyish appearance and laid-back demeanor allowed us to put some of our apprehensions to rest. We followed them as they took us around the center of the city, and then back to their apartment, where there was a guest room with a bed and couch waiting for us. (The place was very comfortable, very clean, but had an overpowering smell that we could just not describe!) The next day we woke up to what would be the best part of staying with Manu and Elodie: breakfast! They prepared the most delicious fresh orange juice I have ever tasted, along with toast, jams, and coffee. It was great (though the breakfast table conversations were a bit lacking). The second breakfast we had with them was churros and chocolate, a typical Spanish breakfast (good, but still nothing like the croissants and pain au chocolats of a typical French breakfast!)
Asides from a free place to stay and breakfast, the other big advantage of CouchSurfing is getting to know someone who lives in the place you're visiting. This provides you with a local's insight on what to do and see, as well as someone to tell you about local customs and traditions that you would otherwise not know about. For us, this made our third day in Valencia incredibly better than it would have otherwise been, and possibly my favorite day of the trip. Having arrived Friday, visited the Aquarium and done a lot of walking and touring Saturday, our idea was to leave to Alicante Sunday after eating
From there we headed to the beach for our lunch reservation at La Pepica, a well-known paelleria where Ernest Hemingway frequently ate. This restaurant can sit up to 450 people, and is right on the beach; getting a window table here was a real treat. Watching the chefs prepare giant paellas was quite fascinating as well. The paella we ordered was the house special made with seafood, and it definitely surpassed our expectations.
That evening we went back to the city center for the traditional event that marks the beginning of Valencia's annual "Fallas", a huge street festival in March where floats and statues are displayed in the streets (and later burnt). Though this festival is not till March, the last Sunday of February marks the "opening" the Fallas season, and is celebrated with a street parade and ceremony known as "La Crida". Thousands of people gathered by the old towers, were there was an areal acrobatic performance, a presentation by the city mayoress, and the most intense fireworks I've seen in my life. The explosions in the grand finale were more like the end of the world than entertainment! Manu and Elodie were defitely right in telling us to stay an extra night to catch that excitement...good thing we listened!
After our third night in Valencia, and our third breakfast at Manu and Elodie's, we packed up and headed south to Alicante for the afternoon. I must mention at this point, the one downfall of the CouchSurfing experience, and how it resulted in us telling a small fib in order to regain our traveling freedom. Though our hosts were incredibly generous and kind, letting us stay with them, showing us around, and feeding us breakfast three days in a row, they seemed to expect to do more 'hosting' than we had in mind. Rather than asking us what our plans were and making open suggestions for joint activities, they acted as though we would follow them wherever they took us without asking any questions or having anything else planned. This, for certain types of travelers who lack the independence of having their own car, or who come with an open calendar and nothings particular in mind, would be a great way to get to know a place. But we had come with the idea that we'd mostly be doing our own thing, and got the feeling this left them a bit disappointed. So when Monday morning came and they asked if we would go with them to a beach town before heading to Alicante, we knew we had to find a reason to part ways. We only had two days left to see Alicante and Toledo and drive back to Zamora (less than we had initially planned), so we knew it wasn't an option. To avoid feeling bad in disappointing them again, we told them we'd be heading straight to Toledo from Valencia, but would look forward to going the next time we visted. As we took the road south towards Alicante after our departure, there was a lasting paranoia that they would somehow pass us on the highway and wonder why we weren't heading west like we had said!
All in all, our road-trip was a sunny, fun, and memorable one, and hopefully won't be the last.
Did I mention it's already feeling like spring over here?! I love it!!!
For the rest of the pictures from our trip, click here.