The post office building is one of the most fabulous in Valencia. We liked these letter slots - lions; one for domestic mail; one for foreign mail. There is also an awning so you don't get rained on when you are posting your mail.
These are all over the place - Spain. Everyone has to sort their trash and put it in the proper bin. It does take away from the ambiance a bit.
This is the street that leads to the Torres de Quart. Just thought it looked nice.
People walk through this portal like it was an everyday thing! No big deal to have medieval towers to walk through on your way to work.
These are the other set of towers in the old city wall. These have signs of cannonballs from Napoleon's army when he came through Valencia. These look to be old; the other towers (Serrano) look brand new although nothing is said anywhere about any restoration.
They have just passed a law outlawing smoking in public places. But if the place is small enough, the proprietor can allow smoking. So we have been seeing a lot of these signs. We actually went in a cafe where smoking was not allowed and nobody else was in there.
We ate here on Sunday - the food was pretty good, and we liked the waiter because he joked around with us. We asked him what he had for dessert, and he listed chocolate tart, pudding. paella valenciano... waiting for us to double take. Har Har. A little valenciano humor there. El Generalife is actually part of the Alhambra, si mal no recuerdo, so I don't know why they have named a restaurant in Valencia El Generalife.
Cathedral on the left, bell tower on the right. This is not a great picture. The bell tower is called El Migelete, for Saint Michael. It is really a beautiful octagonal, I think, tower, with the bell on top. Donna probably has a good picture of it.
It is set up like a Christmas tree, with a star on top, and "Merry Christmas" in several languages on the bottom. I think they decorate it for Christmas during the season.
or City Hall. This week (Friday the 6th) was the Dia de los Reyes, when the Reyes Magos (Magi) come to give gifts to the Christ Child, and not incidentally, bring gifts for all the children in Spain. So there are these manger scenes all over town, and the Reyes Magos arrive by boat the evening of the 5th, and there is a parade. "Belen" is what they call the manger scene, or nativity scene; it means "Bethlehem".
This is a Mercedes. I have been trying to get a picture of a Smart Car and I haven't been able to get one, although I've seen several. But there are other tiny cars around. This one drove up across from the cafe where I was people watching, and double parked, and the elderly gentleman got out and walked across the street with his cane to run some errand.
I think it's a bank building, but it's pretty fabulous. Buildings like this are a dime a dozen around here.
As is true everywhere in Spain (so we have been told), there are pickpockets. I was walking along and saw two policemen (on scooters) pull over this group of young guys and give them a good talking to. Then they let them go on their way. I assume they were pickpockets. But I also gather the cops didn't find anything on them or they wouldn't have let them go. So I took a picture.
All of the cities we have been in in Spain have "escudos", which are used as symbols all over the city. They usually have a pretty ancient origin. This one has a bat, because a bat woke the king up and saved the kingdom from the Moors. Also, the double "l"'s apparently stand for "loyal" (leal), meaning that Valencia is twice as loyal as other cities (to the king, of course). This is the cover in a sidewalk for the traffic signal machinery.
This is in the shopping district heading to the Plaza del Ayuntamiento. I think the orange trees here are great. They are compact and trimmed to be little pompoms, and they are full of oranges.
Just your normal everyday fountain in quite an elegant little neighborhood.
Former palace used now as the ceramics museum. Fantastic baroque portal, and the inside resembles Versailles. But now it is used as the ceramics museum. Ceramics is big in Valencia. Lladro is based here. They had a wonderful collection of Chinese porcelain, and also Valenciano ceramics.
We go in the door with the decoration on top, to the "entresuelo" - where the school is.
Saw this walking along - the remains of an old building, but I don't know more about it.
