Big Head Dancers on Valencia Dock
The first thing that struck us as our ship, the Liberty Of The Seas approached its dock in Valencia was the effort that the Valencia Tourism Foundation put into welcoming the ship and its passengers into the city.
As the passengers began to disembark for a few hours of exploration of this unique destination, a group of musicians and dancers, many sporting fantastic heads. Giants and Big Heads (Gigantes y Cabezudos) have been borrowed from the adjacent Catalan region of Spain, and offer a unique and entertaining spectacle.
The performers, dressed in traditional clothing wear caricature heads that match the clothing style then perform traditional folk dances.
This performance continued for some 2 hours after the ship docked.
Valencia is understood to be Spain’s most important and largest container port.
Whilst Valencia has in the past been seen as a very industrial port city, during the last decade the local Tourism Foundation has really begun to concentrate on promoting Valencia as an area with a rich and diverse culture and customs, as well as exciting social characteristics.
One of the things in favor of this push is that Valencia is able to offer a rich tapestry of architectural history and heritage. Luckily, the people of Valencia have not torn down the old to build up the new.
Unfortunately, the bus trip from the dock into the city center took some 40 minutes, thus reducing the available time for a thorough exploration of Valencia.
In retrospect, because the downtown area of the city is quite spread out, we would probably have been advised to have boarded on of the double deck Valencia Tour Buses that offer a 24 hour ticket for some 15 euros.
However, we elected to walk around the commercial part of Valencia, discovering some of the shops, cafes and historical public buildings.
Excavation in Downtown Valencia
Whilst we wandered around the city, we found ourselves concentrating more on the smaller back streets with their variety of shops, many with fascinating displays of herbs and spices, teas, figurines and many other wares.
It was interesting to note that the inveterate shopper of our group discovered a substantial price difference between shops in the back streets compared with those on the major thoroughfares.
An example of the uncovering of heritage was discovered during our tour of the city when, quite unexpectedly, we chanced upon an excavation on a vacant block of land.
It appeared that, whilst digging foundations for a new building, the workmen had discovered an ancient ruin which was now in the process of being carefully excavated.
The city combines an astonishing array of contrasts – it became the Capital of the Citerior Roman Province in the first century BC, and today boasts some of the best preserved Roman ruins in the Iberian Peninsula. Yet on the outskirts of the city is located one of the biggest oil refineries in the world. The harbor at Tarragona is one of the busiest on the Mediterranean, yet the city has still managed to retain the ambience of a quiet and quaint Spanish town.
Tarragona is also famous for its folklore. The most admired tradition in the region is the “Castellers”, the human castles. Different groups compete to see who can build the tallest human tower, which is crowned by a small child. There are several statues of these castells displayed within the pedestrian mall along the Rambla Nova.