Our first visitors, my brother and his family, arrived on December 26th and we were delighted to show them around.  We spent several days in Valencia, a night in Tarragona and three nights in Barcelona.  I have a lot more to write about all of these places, but for the time, I thought I would simply share some of their reflections on their trip.

The first photo is of them enjoying some chocolate and churros on Thursday morning at the Cabanyal Street Market.

Amy (10) - -

We went to the circus and Ben had to get up and dance to all the music. Mostly all of us thought it was one of the best circus's we have ever seen. Personally that was my first circus so I can't judge it, but I really enjoyed the circus.

 Andy (14) - - When we were in Valencia, it seemed like the cops were very loose with enforcing minor violations. For example, the double parking; it was everywhere. People would park around the corners, halfway up on the sidewalks, and behind parked cars. When they would park behind a parked car in a parking place, they would leave the car in neutral so that the person, who was trapped in the parking spot, could just push the car away to back out. Also, the Vespa's and motorcycles seemed oblivious to any law. They would stop at the red light, and then just go when they had the chance.

The circus in Valencia was also a lot of fun. I was expecting animals doing a lot of tricks, but there were actually only a few animal acts. The few that they did have weren't that good either. The circus was very entertaining and funny.

Alex (17) - - There were schools inside of court yards surrounded by apartment buildings.  The circus we went to see was in a very small tent but still good quality.   

People double parked everywhere and just allowed others to roll there cars out of the way when they needed to move blocked in cars.   All buildings are made out of cement and bricks and look very old. Some parts of the city look run down and there are many buildings that are falling down and/or collapsing and/or under construction.   The 17 y/o male cannot think of other things at the time to write about.

Patrick and the kids strolling through Barcelona

Patrick - - Quite a trip.  Long time getting here but well worth it.  The architeture is amazing - every house has a court yard - really neat.   People really friendly.  Vibrant color for clothes.   

A bakery on every corner.   Local food all tasty.   Beaches look inviting.  Enjoyed shopping.  Would love to come back.  

Jeannie - - Valencia was not what I expected.  It was much larger,more diverse and not as "quaint" as I had pictured. I loved the mix of people, shops, and sights. There were areas that were clean and appeared to be residential for wealthy people and a few blocks away, it was dirtier and more crowded but more friendly. Go figure! Although it was winter, there were palm trees and orange trees in full bloom. The beach was larger and cleaner than I imagined. And there were lots of cultural activities.

Tarragona was my favorite of the 3 cities we visited. It was also on the sea, it was clean and friendly and obviously geared toward the tourist trade. The educational element was also neat because it was fun to go back to the early roman empire days without sitting in a classroom! We could have been in Italy for all I know.  (Photo of Jeannie looking like the parapazzi is following her!)

Barcelona, our last city we visited, seemed huge and tiny, all at once. It was similar to NY because it was crowded and filled with fancy shops. There was also a great cultural center where we saw lots of street entertainers. If we had more time, I'd have loved to go to the theatre, comedy shows or more museums.

All 3 cities were wonderful to walk around. I never felt uncomfortable even with the language barrier.  Of course, all of this would not have been possible without Emily and mitch. Emily was our tour guide, translator, interpreter, organizer, hostess, meal planner and of course shopper. She put lots of effort into making our experience in Spain memorable. I can't thank her enough for opening her home and heart to us.

The festival of Hanukkah has just passed.  Hanukkah commemorates the miracle of oil.  Following the victory of the Jews over the Maccabees, they wanted to rededicate the temple but only had enough oil to burn for one day.  Miraculously, the oil burned for eight days, enough time to prepare new oil. 

It is customary to eat foods fried in oil during the holiday.  I smiled as I made our latkes (potato pancakes)  They were perfect!  Here in Spain, I have become an expert at using vast amounts of olive oil.  As a matter of fact, it's like Hanukkah all year long.  For breakfast, toast with olive oil and salt.  For lunch, some fish, chicken or beef fillets, breaded and thrown into the frying pan.  How about a Spanish tortilla - an egg and potato omelet - made in a frying pan with olive oil?  Garlic and artichokes sauteed in olive oil?  Yup, it's olive oil all day long.  We will get our cholesterol checked the day we get off the plane and we'll see if that olive oil, garlic and wine really do lower your cholesterol.  :)

How do you like our menorahs?  As they say, necessity (and a three year old) are the mothers of invention.

Valencians celebrate Christmas eve with family and eat A LOT of fish - mostly shellfish.  I read that the average Valencian spends 271 euros on food for the holiday.  We were not invited to anyone's house for dinner :( but judging from the lines at the supermarket, the smells from the windows and the cars triple parked in our plaza, there were some major feasts!

We have our very first house guests arrive tomorrow so we have been excitingly preparing!  However, we made some time for a family walk to the beach this afternoon.   Below, the photos....

Can you believe that some Europeans consider the Americans to be tacky????

Confirming that there is too much commercialism on this side of the globe as well.  And well, the trash confirmed the large seafood dinners I have heard about but I don't think I need to share any more details or close up trash pictures. 

 The fishing boats always look so nice, especially later in the day.  Ben runs to play fisherman.

 Check out Ben's surfing moves!

Me?  Embarrassed that my husband insisted on wearing antlers all day while asking me how to say antlers???? And me worrying if what I told him in Spanish slang means something other than antlers????  Never.  And you know, not a single person asked him about them although he received his fair share of looks.  Then again, we often have our dog in the stroller along with a child so that too causes a bit of curiosity.

In our next photo, our sometimes decrepit acting dog took about 8 years off of her life, or so it seemed as she ventured into the ocean and ran circles around us in happiness.  She swam to her heart's content and now is back to her senior self. 

Good night and Bon Nadal!

Yikes - almost 2 weeks since I last posted. A serious blogger would never pull such a thing, ahem, well, I never intended to be a serious blogger. 

Where have I been????

Well, we took a quick day trip to Requena and Utiel, two towns about an hour from Valencia that are known for agriculture and wines. 

I've led a very 'crafty' existence.  I began a quilting class and thus a quilt.  I have been teaching myself to sew and made a purse, a bean bag chair and a collection of pillow cases, some basic quilts, some things for Ben.  Ben and I made gifts for the family using paints, wood, and shells.   I made some jewelry (pearl, garnet and silver necklaces) which I donated to a club we belong too and they were raffled off for charity.

Ben was diagnosed with a serious inner and outer ear infection and his mother felt very, very guilty for not taking him to the doctor sooner.   A few days later, I was also diagnosed with an ear infection so 2 out of 3 in the house are on antibiotics. 

And of course, I have wandered around Valencia quite a bit, observing and contemplating both  the way the Valencians live and the good fortune that I have right now to be here with TIME, to wander and observe.  Time is one of my most precious commodities and I am so grateful to have it at this moment.

More on most of these topics later AND big, warm, holiday wishes from the family in Valencia!

Get Great Prices on Last Minute Flights at LastMinuteTravel.com

Today's deals at EasyClickTravel.com

Premiere Collection of Wines from Around the World

I love the Thursday morning Cabanyal street market.  It takes place in the streets surrounding the Cabanyal food market that is open Tuesday through Saturday from 8-2pm. 

Spain is expensive now, especially if you are shopping with a poor dollar to euro exchange rate.  However the Cabanyal market has lots of bargains.  Here you can find all types of household items from sheets, towels and kitchen items, to clothes, shoes, and coats.  I find it worthwhile to go as often as possible because the merchandise and the prices change. 

I also enjoy the outings because of the 'market Spanish' I hear called out.

"A un euro, un euro, un eurito guapa. Venid guapetona.  Dos euritos." 

There is a playfulness with the words that is always entertaining. 

One week I heard a woman advertising ecological (organic) mops for one euro.  A man walked by and commented to another, "wow (he used another word) even our mops are going organic now.  What next?"  That made me smile. 

There have been lots of posts about kids activities these days and not too much about wine.  However, we did open a bottle of wine yesterday that we really enjoyed.  Castillo San Simon Crianza 2003, Jumilla Denominacion de Origen.  Made with both Tempranillo ande Monastrell grapes.  Purchased at Mercadona for 1.50€.  The label says it was from selected vines and aged in oak for 6 months as well as several more in the bottle.

I have no fancy wine terms to descirbe the wine.  It had a nice, full bodied, fruity taste with balanced tannins.  I liked it.  We first opened it around comida (main meal of day) time around 3pm (this is Spain you know) and I found it to be a bit strong.  I had some more late last night after dinner and really enjoyed it.  I imagine that it also mellowed a bit having been open. 

Mitch, my favorite wine reviewer said, upon first tasting it:  "Mmm.  Buy a case of this.  What was it - between 3 and 4 euros a bottle?"  (Note - that's pricey for us - why pay more if it's this good at 2 euros a bottle crowd)  He also said it had a lot of flavor and kind of made his tongue curl.  I think that means tannins. 

Overall - a highly recommend wine for those in the Valencian area and anyone else who can find it.

My baby is a big boy in so many ways.  After those painful posts of taking away the pacifier from him, I can say that the "ba" as he called it is a distant memory.  Yes, he cried more than I care to remember for the first five days, but that stage is gone.  As is the diaper and the trauma with using the potty.  As for sleeping - well - he still challenges us a bit each night and it involves a bit of time - about an hour - on our part.  But he does stay put for the night so that is also an improvement.

How I really recognize that my boy has grown up is his "photography." I wrote about the fisher price kids tough camera that we gave him several weeks ago.  I'll admit, the quality is not great, but it is wonderful to be able to leave his camera out and not to have to worry about him dropping or breaking it.  He takes pictures when he is inspired to - and that in itself is inspiring for a parent. 

Some of my favorite pictures that he took over the last several weeks are of our dog watching tv (by the way - she is blind,) a puzzle which he completed and of which he was proud, and some views he liked of Teruel and Albarracin when we were sightseeing.  There was no prodding or encouraging on our part.  That simple exercise of independence and choice of what to photograph and document, made by a three year old, is somewhat inspiring to me.   

View of Albarracin and papa's coat.  

 To the right - a fountain in Teruel. 

Finally - the view from the car seat.  Hmm.  Not too interesting back there is it?  Maybe we parents should be more understanding with the crankiness that can erupt from back there huh?

When we were speeding through a museum in Teruel, as we typically do with our son, a museum guide suggested we return to visit without our child.  I imagine that for an art or history buff, the speed at which we see museums must shock them.  However, often 30-45 minutes is plenty of time for us in a museum.  With the exception of an occasional dinner out, I actually enjoy sight-seeing with a three year old.  It keeps us outdoors a lot and also introduces us to lots of fun things off the beaten path – like the mini train town we visited today.

La Granja park in Burjassot, Valencia has small train tracks running through it, creating a train journey from one station to another.  Just like the train table you may find in a book store or a toy store, there was a bridge, a tunnel and some places where the tracks cross and one train needs to wait for the other to pass.  Unlike that play set however, we all got to ride this train.  Ben was in heaven.  We were lucky to get onto the first two cars so the view was great but the steam smell was strong. 

Although the township of Burjassot owns the train, an association of former railroad works and train enthusiasts runs it.   In the Summer months, the train runs from 6pm-8:30pm on Saturdays and during the rest of the year it runs on Sundays from 11:30-1:30pm.   The ticket prices are .60 centimos for ages 4-14 and 2.35 for adults 14 and over. 

Overall, an excellent way to spend a Sunday morning with a child.  Plus, we found this great churro  stand right outside the park and the owner gave us some dough to play with!

Today we went to the circus in Valencia.  The Gran Circo Wonderland in the Plaza de Toros (Bull Ring.)  Given that it's a large bull ring, we splurged on the tickets and bought 2 front row seats for 32 euros each.  Our seats were great – we were less than 20 feet from the ring – however – I think almost every seat would have been great.  The tent and all the seats were set up within the arena of the plaza – quite a small area.  There were also very few people in the audience – 300 perhaps.  I'm not sure if that is because of the pricing or because there is another circus starting any day now in another part of Valencia.   

The show last 2.5 hours with a 15 minute intermission and we had a great time.  This circus was nothing like the Ringling Brothers Circus that I took Ben to at the MCI Center last year.  It had almost a small town quality about it.  There were no nets beneath any of the performers.  There were no mats either with the exception of one yoga mat placed on the ground for the dismount from the "wheel of the death" about 60 feet up.  We saw some errors but no injuries.  The only time there was a cage in the arena was when there were tigers there.  Other than that, the elephants, camels, zebras, ostriches, rhino and great American bison were just meters away.  The animal training seemed to be a work in progress – but we enjoyed getting to witness some of the mishaps.

This circus was loud.  Very loud.  We had to cover our three year old's sensitive ears for everything except the thunderous tacky dance music which he seemed to love most of all.  He jumped, boogied and break danced to it all for the audience.  Clearly, we are not playing the right music at home.

During intermission, the cast members came around with the cutest one month old baby lion as well as a snake to pose with the audience.  We coughed up the 15 euros to pose with the lion but passed on the snake.  

Oh – and I almost forgot that my husband got to participate in the act. Here are some shots of him imitating the clown and forming part of a human chair experiment with the 3 other audience participants.

Last weekend we discovered Albarracin and Teruel, towns about 2 hours from Valencia.  Albarracin is a delightful village about 40 km west of Teruel that should not be missed.  The town sort of erupts from the red rocks that surround it and the views are fantastic.   The houses here are actually narrower on the bottom than the top so the streets and alleys are completely narrow and dark. 

 We really noticed the temperature change.  The town is at about 1200 meters- roughly 3600 feet and the air was dry, crisp and chilly.  Quite a change from Valencia where I am convinced has the best climate in all of peninsular Spain.  (Actually, on the Sunday we returned, I noticed that it was warmer in Valencia than in Las Palmas, Gran Canaria.  Wow.!)

The most impressive feature of the town is the castle wall that surrounds it.  The walkway tower – el Torre de Andador – dates from the 9^th century, when Albarracin was an important Muslim town and military post.  It was quite a hike. 

Since we had left our pooch dog in the car as we had a quick bite, we knew we had to take her on our excursion.  We loaded up Ben's stroller and brought one of Mitch's sweaters in case.  In the end, Mitch ended up carrying our dear, blind Jack Russell terrier, sitting in the stroller to the castle walkway on the top of the mountain. It goes without saying that the people we saw hiking on the way up as well as the way down were really wondering about us. 

If that isn't love for your dog what is?  I should mention, even though she is blind and mostly deaf by now, we could tell that she truly appreciated the crisp air atop the mountain and being part of the outing.   

From Albarracin, we headed to Teruel.  We weren't sure what to expect as the guidebooks dedicate very little to Teruel and describe it as a 'has been' town whose fame was centuries ago and whose recent slogan was – Teruel existe (Teruel exists.) We were pleasantly surprised.

We stayed at the Hotel Reina Cristina, principally because pets are allowed.  The hotel chain has 2 hotels in this town, and although the other one was less expensive, we are happy we paid an additional 20 euros to be in the middle of the old town.  The hotel was fine.  Nothing out of the ordinary, except for the timed lights that go on in the long hallways just as you walk into the darkness.  (Our three year old appreciated that.)  The rooms are not particularly big but the bathrooms were clean and we were impressed with the tiny balcony off our room that completely insulated us from the noise outside.

We enjoyed walking around the town.  Mudejar architecture – (the Muslim style that flourished under Christian rule) is everywhere.  The Torre of El Salvador was right beside our hotel and the views from the top were fantastic. 

The town's most famous legend is that of a forbidden love between a girl and a boy, Isabel and Diego.  There are so many versions of the story but in a nut shell, he returned a day later than he should have and Isabel was forced to marry someone else.  They both died of heartbreak. 

The Escalinata is a beautiful plaza that is located between the Renfe train station and the many flights of grand steps built in the 1920s that lead up to the Paseo de Ovalo.  The steps are beautifully decorated.  There is also an elevator that links the plaza with the main part of town.  At night, the lighting and the modernist approach to the elevator in contrast with the Mudejar architecture and stairs was a sight to see.  Bauhaus with a Mudejar twist.  (Apologies to the architects out there – remember – I'm the one reviewing the $1.00 Spanish wines :)  I wasn't able to take a picture since I had just stepped out to walk the dog.  My recommendation if you visit Teruel.  The night views are almost as spectacular or even more so than the day views.

Speaking of wines, Mitch was impressed with the house wine we ordered at dinner at the restaurant Tapas y Copas en Teruel.  It was a private label for the restaurant bottled by heredad pangua sodupe.  It was a Rioja joven, cosecha 2004.  6.5 euros (price in restaurant)  There were a lot of children in the restaurant so I was surprised when they gave our three year old a wine glass for the water with lemon that I ordered for him.  Believe it or not, the glass survived, even with Ben insisting on holding the stem of the glass as he sipped his water.