University of Louisiana at Lafayette Athletics
Spain Day Five: Valencia, Bullfighting and Doppelgängers
8/12/2013 6:00:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Spain Trip Central
Day 5: August 12, 2013 - Valencia
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VALENCIA, Spain – I had to think about what day it was today, it seems like we've been in Spain for a while now. The entire team is now fluent in Spanish! Just kidding, we struggle.
Today was a bit of a later start, departing for our tour of the city at 10:30. We drove around the "new" part of Valencia, seeing very new and interesting looking buildings. We learned that within the last 15 years the town has been vastly upgraded and cleaned up. Our Valencia tour guide, Claudia, credited some of the cleaning up to the city being awarded the America's Cup yacht race in 2007 and 2009, and the European Grand Prix annually. Personally, that made me very happy to work in sports, knowing that they can help a city in that capacity.
While mentioning that, she also mentioned that we were currently driving ON the grand prix tracks, another very cool thing to learn.
After the tour of the "new" city, we went to our guided tour of Plaza de Toros de Valencia, a bull fighting museum and ring in Valencia.
The first thing we saw upon entering the museum was a large banner with faces of the rings toreros (bullfighters). Soon thereafter, we noticed one of the toreros had a striking resemblance to our own Steven Wronkoski. We asked the tour guide about him and he said his name was Ramon, and that he was currently training in the facility. Halfway through the tour we saw him, but were not able to get a photo of the two together because he was too busy getting ready for a fight next week.
After seeing Wronkoski's doppelgänger, we continued on to see the rest of the ring and learn a thing or two about the event itself, before continuing on to a walking tour of the "old" town of Valencia.
Valencia in itself dates back to the early times of human history and the Roman civilization. In one place we would see a newly built bank or office building, and the next corner we'd see an old city wall dating back to the 14th century.
The tour of the old city led to lunch and a bit of time to explore on our own. Once again, lunch was McDonalds, due to price and the fact that they know what they get there.
While on our walking tour we were shown a very old church with a bell tower that could see the entire city from the top. The only problem with the bell tower was that it was 207 steps up a spiral staircase to get up there, no elevator. Three staff members, myself included, decided to make the climb. The view was worth much more than the work and two euro's it took to get to the top.
After we got back from the exploration of the old city, it was time to head out to practice, 30 minutes outside of town.
The guys got a good practice in and look ready for the game tomorrow in Albacete.
Dinner was the last thing on the menu for the night (hopefully everyone has been able to bear my puns thus far), and for the first time in our trip, calamari was not on the menu! That pleased most of the group, even those who liked it were getting sick of it.
Half the team took the bus back, while he other half walked back after dinner to enjoy the night. Our tour guide said earlier in the day that it is sunny 300 days a year in Valencia, which we believe to be true considering we never saw a single cloud during the two days here.
Tomorrow we will kick the day off with a bit of free time, before boarding the bus again to go to our third of four cities, Albacete, and our first game of the tour, meaning tomorrow will have both a game recap, and a day recap, and hopefully more photos.
Until tomorrow,
Nick Ross
Please feel free to let me know if you are following the Cajuns' trip to Spain, where you are following from, and if you have any questions. The email you can reach me at is NickRoss@louisiana.edu. I have enjoyed hearing back from who has been following along.
It is amazing to hear back from fans following from not only the Acadiana area, but from all around the world! I've heard back from people in Florida, Texas, Minnesota (thanks Mom, Dad and Jaime!), and even Equatorial Guinea!
I have received several requests for more photos, please do not think I am ignoring you. I am trying to get them up as soon as I can, however the internet has been very slow and fussy when it comes to uploading photos.
