Valencia, Spain

Hello guys; I’m sorry that it’s been a while, but to be honest sometimes life is made to lived outside of routine. At the end of the month of May, I spent a week in Spain, more specifically in Valencia. The last time that I visited was fourteen years ago, so it was surprising how much of the main sights that I remembered from that previous visit, although that said, it was nice to have a proper camera to capture the memories on. One of things that I loved about where we stayed was that it was in a village rather than a town; a lovely way to see the area without feeling like a stereotypical tourist. There was a beautiful view of the surrounding mountains and rural countryside, which I enjoyed attempting to capture whilst on a walk every day, morning and evening. It was definitely better using my DLSR than my iPhone, simply because the colour range, depth of field and general tools made the image look as close to the view as possible, whereas my iPhone only managed to capture the overall details rather than the full details. Alongside visits to the beach, the town, local shopping centres and wandering the streets, one of my favourite sights that I visited during this trip was the Collegiate Basilica of Gandía. I read, slept and ate a whole lot during the week break and I have no regrets, even though I feel heavier than ever, oops. 

I said in a blog post right at the start of this year that I wanted to travel more, which I do feel as though I’m managing to meet that life target, having explore two countries this year so far and looking to end of this year and beginning of next year, there are three more countries ready to explore in my plans. Spain is a country that I wasn’t desperate to visit, as I have visited before, but having now revisited, I can say that for sure I would like to explore the country further; there’s something lovely about the people, the food, the sights and the lifestyle in general that appeals to me. I enjoyed exploring the streets, the markets, the central squares and seeing little independent shops and cafés at every corner, but ultimately I loved the slower pace, the chilled atmosphere. My favourite pastime was watching the sun set over the mountains, which I spent literally days attempting to capture correctly on my camera; there was something so calming about sitting and watching. I have a habit of trying to do too much of everything, such as work, blogging, reading, etc and so it was nice to slow myself down and simply appreciate life. I didn’t do as many of the tourist-like things that I generally wold when exploring as I was travelling with an older (and physically disabled) person, but actually I didn’t mind too much. It was nice to slow down and enjoy company the world rather than tick off a list. I’ve definitely caught the travel bug now. Until my next trip!