Future world with free parking thrown in

Interesting post bike packing breakfast - lots of local toast toppings & not much else. Some I got marmalade & peach jam, there was the usual Spanish tomato thing, a honey & something else spread that clearly was less than the sum of the parts & the climax - a soft cheese with truffle shavings in - surprisingly good. Packed up & set out the next leg of the castle trail. Tried to get up to the local watchtowers but parking was limited, the road was narrow & I was jittery about the car getting scratches - '€300' they said. Pushed on & not 10km had passed & another castle. Managed to get a bit closer with aircon ie the car. As before nice views, striking location & closed. Take the hint. Next 2, decided to admire from a distance - namely the motorway. Thankfully, the first burst of Valencia in the car would be Sunday morning & even more thankfully I found a spot near the hotel. Some kind gent made sure I didn't pay - apparently Mon - Sat 9am - 4pm. Just means I need to head off somewhere before 9 - doable. Decided to try & see as much of the city today & do the beach tomorrow morning. First stop - The Mestalla Stadium - Valencia FC & site of a certain Mr R Benitez's first great successes. Had to go a pay homage. Bit of a battle getting there in that it was just so hot - still. Tried to take it easy but sweat was pouring off. Took a strategic aircon break & evetually made it. Quiet a striking stadium. Found the stadium tour window & eventually figured out that they'd stopped the tours 30 mins earlier. Ho-hum. Back to the madly weird views of the Science & Arts district where I was staying. In this heat indoor exhibitions were the way to go. Couldn't find the entrance to the Palais Artes - which was something of a relief. Next the Hemispheric which turns out was a big Imax cinema & they were showing a NASA film on the journey to Mars. Originally I'd planned to go to the science museum but this was too tempting. On returning at the set time of 4 & finding an epic queue with more than the requisite quota of noisy children I was less sure. Eventually settled in to my seat with my stupid headset on. To be fair, while it was clearly just a NASA puff piece biggibg themselves up, it was still impressive.Read more