Valencia is a beautiful city located in the East of Spain, into the borders of the Mediterranean Sea, just in the center of a great plain of fertile orchard that is crossed by the "Túria" River.
It is its condition of Mediterranean capital what gives him an open, festive and cosmopolitan character. The blessing of an earth where the sky always shines with intense blue; a place whose light reach all the corners and where the climate always invites to enjoy life.

Historical Moments

It is necessary to look back more than 2100 years ago (look back into the Roman "Valentia") to find the origins of Valencia, but it was on 13th century, after Jaime I conquest to the Muslims, when the city begins to acquire great importance as it becomes the capital of Kingdom of Valencia (kingdom associated to Aragon's crown).
Importance that will be increasing with time until leading it at its moment of maximum splendor in 15th century, when it became the most important city of the "Kingdom of Aragon" and one of the richest and most important commercial centers of the old Mediterranean gothic Europe.
Good demonstration of those times of splendour are the multitude of civilian, military and religious buildings that still remains from that age: Lonja (Market of the Silk), Cathedral and Miguelete, Towers of Serranos, Towers of Cuarte, Palace of the Generalidad (Majority)... as well as the blossoming of the Valencian arts and language, with universal writers like Joanot Martorell or Ausias March.

Although the discovering of América supposed the end of the Mediterranean Sea as the center of the commercial world, the history of Valencia does not finish in 16th century.
All the posterior ages of the History have been leaving their sign in the city: we found pure Renaissance in the building of the Patriarch, baroque in basilica of the Virgin or tower of Santa Catherine, the Rococo in that splendid building that is Palace of the Marques of Dos Aguas. Being the end of 19th century and the beginnings of 20th; another age of intense flourishing of arts and all of its different variants.

Finally, with the arrival of the 21st century, the city maintains its bet of future and sends its glance towards the Third Millenium with the intention of revalidating the same European prestige and recognition that already enjoyed in 15th century and extend it into world-wide levels.
And we can find great demonstration of this in the incessant construction of new futurist buildings like Palace of Congresses or monumental like the City of Arts and Sciences; the multitude of cultural events that fills the calendar year after year; the celebration of America's Cup in the 2007 and the reputation that the celebrations of Valencia, specially the Fallas Festivities, are getting in the World.

The Fallas Festivities

Precisely, if there is something that better characterizes Valencia with special intensity, this is the Fallas Festivity (celebrated from 15 to 19 of March): the greatest, most beautifully and spectacular of Spanish festivities and possibly one of the most exciting celebrations of the entire World.
Without doubt, they are extraordinary, catalogued as "international artistic interest" and something that everybody has to know at least once in his life.

All the city districts gets filled of fallas (more than 700 fallas are mounted in the city, and some of them are more than 20 meters height) and the streets gets decorated to celebrate the "fallera week", a magical week in which all the citizens go out and where all the city is transformed to receive the avalanche of visitors, being therefore the best moment to enjoy the city and to join with its people. An unforgettable experience where art, tradition, music, powder, colors, flowers, light and sound are mixed without equal: a true joy for all the senses.

Nature

But, aside from all the previous one, Valencia does not only limit to the traditional forms of understanding the tourism (monuments and strolling): if what the visitor looked for is nature in contrast to the urban landscapes, he can't forget that apart of the rich and colorful fields of orchard that surrounds the city, there is a natural place of exceptional beauty: the Albufera Lagoon.
A fresh water lake, at the south of the city, kissing the sea... in a place where the rice has been cultivated since unmemorable times and where it could be tasted on its most traditional plates... and a place where is possible to contemplate one of the most beautiful Sunsets imaginable.
And, also, here it is possible to enjoy the longest extensions of beach from all Spain . Beaches (for example: El Saler, La Malva-rossa or Las Arenas) that every summer gets plenty of swimmers and people that want to get a pan into their skins.

Gastronomy

Finally, it is impossible to forget the gastronomy, which is as varied and splendid as the above talked.
In order to begin, Valencia is the origin place of one of most famous plates of the world: the Paella. But it is an error to reduce all the Valencian gastronomy to one plate: arroz al horno, arroz negro (black rice), fideua, eels with "all-i-pebre" salse... thera are an enormous amount of recipes and different plates to taste.
And, moreover, summer can be enjoyed with a refreshing "horchata with fartons" and winter with liquid warm chocolate accompanied with the traditional "bunuelos" (kind of fried doughnuts).
Famous, therefore, by its buildings... its celebrations and their people... its climate and its beaches... by the fruits of its orchard and its rice... the international prestige of Valencia is greater every time and every day there are more and more tourists that decide to include to the city in their list of preferred tourist places.

This Web page was born, therefore, with the desire of open a new window of this city to the world, so anyone can discover the most significant places and learn about some of the best stamps of the city, being the discovering of the rest only delayed for the moment in which the visitor decides to come and discover by itself the enchantments of one of the best secrets kept in Spain. Don't get scared and come to know Valencia, the city for the Third Millennium, the city that will surprise you...