Bike Tour

Bike Tour



For me, life with a bike is a lot better than life without a bike. In fact, almost all of my stay here on the planet has been in the company of a bicycle, or bicycles in the best of times. They are my main source of exercise, transportation, and recreation all at the same time. My first month here in Spain was a living hell of endless walking. I wish that I could say that I am a better person for what I endured that month but every time a I ride around town and see just how far I was walking it gives me cold shivers just thinking about those sad, bike-less times.

Yesterday the temperature was inching close to 70 degrees (try writing that sentence using the metric system). New Year’s Eve is called Nochvieja in Spain and it is, of course, a holiday. Not that the Spanish need much of an excuse to take the day off, but this is a fairly big holiday for them. It was a great day to bike around town because there was very little automobile traffic.

I have mentioned that Valencia has a great network of dedicated bike paths—as do many European cities. These usually run along the sidewalk nearest to the street. Pedestrians often stray into the bike path, or Carril Bici in Spanish, but they know they don’t belong there and will move out of the way when they see you approaching. Automobiles have an equal amount of respect for cyclists here and will give you the right-of-way at all times. I have never had a car honk at me, even when I’m, doing something stupid, like riding the wrong way down a very narrow street. About the only vehicles with assholes for drivers are the mopeds which seem to have only two speeds: idling and full blast. I haven’t figured it out yet but mopeds really bring out the worst in people.

Either on foot or on bike I have traversed almost every street in the old section of Valencia. I am still being rewarded by new discoveries as I was yesterday when I happened upon the Plaza del Carmen. I was riding down the wrong way on a one way street when I came upon the shaded plaza and the cathedral; something I wouldn’t have tried on a normal day of traffic. I spent a good part of the afternoon meandering through the narrow streets and alleys of Ciutat Vella where the only hazards were avoiding pedestrians and dodging soccer balls. I lot of the time I was riding around the old section I couldn’t even hear an automobile. I was rewarded with the sound of church bells ringing, or the music of a violin coming from the balcony of an apartment.

I can cover a lot of ground in a three hour bike ride. I rode through the Real Gardens where I took this picture of families taking advantage of the sunshine at the park café. I crisscrossed most of the downtown and before I went home I rode down to the beach. On a bike it’s only five minutes from where I live, or 13 hours if you are walking.


From the look of things from my balcony it seems that everything will be shut down today as well. I need even less of an excuse to go for a bike ride than Spanish people need to take the day off.