6/16: Valencia

Got up this morning in time to have breakfast with the Swedes (pineapple, oranges, and orange juice, plus ham & cheese, they really love their ham here!), and then we all headed off to L`Oceonografic (the aquarium) for the day. Katie had told me to go to the Aquarium and the Swedes had been wanting to, so we went for it. It´s a pretty long walk, about 45 minutes, but from our hostel we could walk all of it through this really long, big park with lots of trees and fountains and playgrounds and a football (soccer) field in it. The park is really nice and there´s always people jogging or biking or hanging out in it, and it reminds me a little of Balboa Park because there are a whole bunch of museums all right next to each other at the end of it, just like Balboa Park has. The museums are really crazy, with this insane architecture. One of them looks like a cross between the cyborg mothership, a Roman helmet, and a cruise ship. They´re all gleamingly white with little moats and mini-rivers of white mosaic tiles that are quietly blue around them and cypresses on the terraces on the top floors. Verrrrry cool - pictures to come soon, plus more in the next few days, I would guess. The Aquarium is actually a little beyond the first museums, and it would be easy to get to them except that there´s a huge construction site in between so you have to go around. However, the Aquarium is really really really cool. It´s like a combination of Sea World and the Birch Aquarium, with 7 different sea/climate zones and a dolphin show and stuff. The coolest part is that each zone is a separate building from the entrance building, and they´re all underground. So if you go to the Mediterranean section, there´s a little building that you enter, then you go down a bunch of stairs, and the aquarium for that type of sea life is all huge and underground. It´s a very innovative design. It´s the same for all of them, even the ones with the beluga whales and walruses. The only things above ground are the tropical birds (in a big birdcage that looks like an overgrown hamster ball or something), the sea lions, and the dolphin show. Speaking of which, this is a pretty fucking awesome dolphin show, I must say. Katie had told me that Andres the Dolphin Trainer was hot, and I didn´t get a close look, but he seemed quite attractive, but there were 7 or 8 dolphins in this show, plus 5 or 6 more looking forlorn and alone in the back pool because the other dolphins were getting all the fishes. Poor lil guys. They kept doing half-ass tricks, and it was like they were saying ´look! I can do it too!!! give me some damn fishes!´ The show was very cool though.

One thing I did dislike about the Aquarium is one of my favorite things about other Aquariums I´ve been to. In most aquariums, people are fairly quiet and just observe, but NO. Not the Valencians. It was really really loud in there, and lots of rude people.

Anyway, the aquarium was rather expensive (18€ even with my student discount), but we spent the whole day there so it was definitely worth it.

Had pears and blue cheese and pistachios for dinner, along with some pink wine from a box (yeah for that awesome .80€ boxed wine!!) and beers later. Played pool with the Swedes and Peter and I kicked Brett and Linda´s butts. Also met a Brit named John who had seen two guys fucking in the bushes in the park at duskish. Apparently they saw him, moved a few trees away, and went back at it. Eeeks.

It´s been a good day.