Looking south over Valencia from the Micalet tower. (Photo: Tango7174, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Every March, Valencia builds hundreds of giant, satirical sculptures in its streets — some as tall as 25–30 metres — and then, on the night of March 19, burns them. The festival, Falles, draws up to two million visitors and is on UNESCO's list of intangible cultural heritage. But the city (València in Valencian) is worth a visit any time of year: Spain's third-largest, with just over 830,000 people in 2023, the capital of the Valencian Community, and — after Barcelona — the most important cultural center on Spain's Mediterranean coast, known for its old town, its ultramodern architecture, its beaches and its paella.
The city's story
| When | What |
|---|---|
| 2nd century BCE | Valentia Edetanorum founded as a Roman colony |
| early 8th century | the Moors take it; as Balansiyya it becomes capital of a Muslim taifa, trading in paper, silk, ceramics, glass and silver |
| 11th century | a brief spell of Christian rule under El Cid |
| 1238 | King Jaume I of Aragon takes the city; it becomes a kingdom of the Crown of Aragon |
| 15th century | the golden age: the Micalet bell tower, the Silk Exchange and the Serrans towers; the city helps fund Columbus's first voyages |
| 1609 | Jews and Moriscos are expelled — the Moriscos were about a third of the region's people — and the economy takes more than a century to recover |
| 1936–1939 | capital of Republican Spain, heavily bombarded in the Civil War; Franco later bans the Valencian language |
| 1957 | the Túria floods the old city, killing more than 80; the river is diverted south, and its old bed eventually becomes a park |
| 2007–2012 | the America's Cup (2007 and 2010) and Formula One's European Grand Prix (2008–2012) |
The city's popularity has a cost: like Barcelona, Valencia suffers from overtourism, and locals in the old town and by the beaches sometimes feel pushed out.
What to see
- The Silk Exchange (Llotja de la Seda), built between 1482 and 1533, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of Europe's most important secular Gothic buildings; its trading hall is known as the Hall of Columns.
- The cathedral (La Seu) stands where a Roman temple, a Visigothic cathedral and a mosque stood before it; the Gothic building was begun in 1262. Climb its octagonal bell tower, the 51-metre Micalet, for the view. Every Thursday at noon, at the cathedral's Apostles' Door, the Water Tribunal settles disputes between farmers over irrigation, as it has since Moorish times.
- The city gates: the Serrans towers, built in 1392, and the Quart towers are survivors of the old walls.
- The City of Arts and Sciences (Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències), by the Valencian architect Santiago Calatrava, includes a science museum, the Umbracle garden and L'Oceanogràfic, the largest aquarium in Europe. Calatrava's cable-stayed Assut de l'Or bridge, 125 m tall, is the city's highest point.
- The Túria Gardens (Jardí del Túria): after the 1957 flood, the dry riverbed became a 7-km park winding through the city, crossed by old and new bridges.
- Museums: fine arts in a 17th-century palace, modern art at the IVAM, the National Ceramics Museum in an extravagant Baroque palace, and museums of silk and rice.
- Neighborhoods: the old El Carme, full of cafés and street art; Russafa, once a Moorish pleasure garden; and El Cabanyal, a 13th-century fishing village by the beach.
The Hall of Columns in the Silk Exchange. (Photo: No machine-readable author provided. Felivet~commonswiki assumed (based on copyr, Public domain)
The science museum in the City of Arts and Sciences, by Santiago Calatrava. (Photo: Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The Túria Gardens, in the old riverbed, with the Museum of Fine Arts behind. (Photo: Toutaitanous, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The Serrans towers. (Photo: Felivet, Public domain)
The Water Tribunal outside the cathedral. (Photo: Martinvl, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Falles
It began in the Middle Ages, when the city's carpenters burned piles of scrap near their workshops on March 19, the eve of St Joseph's day. By the 18th century the junk was being shaped with papier-mâché into figures, ninots, assembled into larger fallas that soon turned satirical. Banned with Carnival around 1870, the festival was revived by a popular movement; a competition for the best falla in 1885 led to the casals fallers, neighbourhood associations that raise money and build their fallas all year.
Today there are about 400 casals, each building a large falla and a children's one. Every day from March 2 to 19, at 14:00 in the town-hall square, the mascletà sets off 120 kg of gunpowder in a "symphony of noise" you feel through your whole body — arrive an hour early. Streets compete with light displays; there is a great flower offering, L'Ofrena; and fireworks go off everywhere, all day. On the night of the 19th comes La Cremà: the children's fallas burn at 22:00, the big ones between midnight and 1:00, and the town-hall square's falla last.
A falla of the top category, surrounded by its ninots. (Photo: Falconaumanni, CC BY-SA 3.0)
L’Ofrena, the flower offering. (Photo: Rafa Esteve, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Beaches, food and the seasons
The city's beaches, Les Arenes and Malvarrosa, lie north of the port, with a promenade and crowds in summer; next door, Patacona is quieter and a good place to try horchata, whose key ingredient, chufa (tiger nut), is grown in Alboraya. South of the port, the beaches belong to the Albufera Natural Park.
Real paella comes in several versions — valenciana with chicken or rabbit, seafood, or mixed — and every cook has an opinion, though none that deserves the name contains sausage, ham or meat stock. It is cooked fresh in a special iron pan over a wood fire, is rather dry rather than soupy, and the caramelized rice at the bottom is the best part. Try also arròs negre, black with squid ink, arròs a banda in fish stock with alioli, and fideuà.
Summer is hot and humid (30–35 °C by day), and August is quiet as residents go on holiday; September still allows beach days; winter hovers around 10 °C; and Falles marks, unofficially, the start of spring.
Malvarrosa beach. (Photo: Mihael Grmek, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Arròs negre. (Photo: Tamorlan, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The Mercat Central, the city’s great food market. (Photo: Tatiana.albani, CC BY-SA 3.0 es)
Sources
- "Valencia" from Wikivoyage, by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changed: rewritten in hubnx's own words and condensed; listings, addresses, prices, opening hours and phone numbers left out; each photo under its own licence, credited in its caption. This page is shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 · Adapted from en.wikivoyage.org
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