Day 2- Sunday.

A beautiful day to bike around Valencia. It's an old Roman city and we biked through the highlights noting the architecture of the many prior conquers. It was sunny and temperate. Our efforts were rewarded with tapas and cervezas in the park.

After dinner outside at the grill, Kyle Esplin entertained. He is self taught and doesn't read music. He hardly looked at the keys while playing. Some people are just naturals- ok, yes, I am jealous as all my years of piano lessons clearly did not pay off.

Day 3- Monday

We took a 45 minute drive out to see Valencia Oranges at Huetro Ribera. We learned a great deal from the owner's daughter about fruit and the economic conditions of farmers. Clearly a passion project as its a very, very difficult process to remain economically viable.

Along the way we drove through Valencia Province which was devastated by flooding on October 29th. More than 120,000 cars were destroyed and are still lining the sides of the roads. The area that was affected is predominately industrial and we saw buildings that are full of mud and still vacant. Apparently the flood affected 6000 companies, 78 villages and will lead to the destruction of 5000 houses (some are already fully destroyed and others are no longer safe and will be demolished). In 1957 the city of Valencia flooded and they built a canal to divert the river water way from the city. It was this channel that flooded from rain that fell an hour away, then rushed down the canal to the affected area. Apparently there were 2 meters of water on the highway on which we drove. Nearly a month after the flooding we observed the damage for miles away from the canal. Nature is amazing in its majesty, might and sometimes, its devastation.