With Covid travel restrictions being lifted and travelling becoming easier, we decided to use the February half-term as a chance to escape the depressing winter weather in the UK and head to Spain on a last-minute five-day city break to Valencia.
A welcome escape from the UK winter
Storms were battering England as we left, so we were pleased to see weather forecast to be sunny and in the low to mid twenty degrees at our destination and it was a welcome relief stepping off the plane at Valencia in to pleasantly warm sunshine and bright blue, cloudless skies.
Although the weather was good for us, the day after we left the forecast took a turn for the worst and there was a week of rain, which would really have made the trip much less enjoyable if we’d travelled on that week.
Getting around Valencia
Public transport around Valencia is superb. We’d been advised not to bother with a hire care, as car parking is very difficult in the city and the various public transport links are so good, a car would be more hassle than it’d be worth.
Valencia Airport is about 10km outside the city and our hotel – the SH Valencia Palace – was located right in the city centre.
There is an underground ‘metro’ train line right inside the airport, which took us close to the hotel.
As first-time visitors it was very difficult for us to figure out what tickets we’d need as a family to get us around the Metro, but the attendant at the ticket booth was helpful and sold us a three day pass that covered the entire Metro and included trams and all buses in the city on one single ticket, which cost us about £60 in total for all five of us. That was well worth having.
Day 1: La Malvarossa Beach
For our first trip out, we decided to head out on a bus to one of Valencia’s most popular beaches – La Malvarossa.
Being February the beach was pretty quiet. Most people – presumably the locals – were wrapped up in coats, but there were still people sunbathing and swimming in the sea.
For us, used to freezing winter temperatures back home, we could happily sit around in the sun, with temperatures as warm as a good Spring day back home, although as it got later, the temperatures began to drop and jumpers / jackets were definitely needed.
We sat outside in a restaurant and had a delicious meal of Tapas and fish before heading back to the hotel for an early night after a long day of travelling.
Day Two: Touring the City on hire bikes
For our first full day, we decided to make use of the public bike hire service called Valenbisi.
Although the confusing website took some time to figure out, we managed to book a week-long ticket for each of us, allowing us all to access the thousands of bikes that are spread all round the city.
The cost for that, for all of us, was another £60 or so, but was definitely money well spent as it gave us full flexibility to explore the city wherever and whenever we wanted.
You simply enter a PIN code at the bike terminals to unlock a bike and then place it back at one of the hundreds of terminals all around the city when you’re finished.
Cycling (and e-scootering) seem the most popular way to get around Valencia and there are dedicated cycle lanes absolutely everywhere.
We felt perfectly safe cycling around with children – especially as many cycle routes take you through a large passage – an old dried up river bed – which runs from one end of the city to the other, away from the traffic and with plenty of shady / sunny places to stop to rest along the way.
Our first visit was to the ‘old town’ via the landmark ‘Serranos Towers’ – the gateway to the old town.
We wandered around looking in shops and stopped in the central square, sitting for an hour or two in a pavement cafe in the sun with drinks whilst local musicians played.
With the warm sun on our faces and the enjoyable atmosphere of the town we were in a good mood and glad we’d made the trip here.
Using Google Maps, we decided we could cycle from the Old Town down to the nearest beach, which is Playa de Las Arenas, to get another lunch by the beach.
Somehow we managed to either misjudge the distance, or took a wrong turn, as what we thought would be a 10 or 15 minute ride turned in to well over an hour’s trek through building sites and housing estates, which none of the family were too happy about by the end.
We did eventually reach the Playa de Las Arenas beach, which is a beautiful, huge expanse of golden sand with a wide promenade lined with restaurants.
What was meant to be lunch had actually become dinner – after which we got a bus back to the hotel.
Day Three: Mercat Central & Plaza De Ayuntamiento
The next day we headed out on the bikes again to the impressive ‘Mercat Central’ and spent some time looking around at the incredible displays of produce and food in the huge market building, before heading up to the Plaza De Ayuntamiento, which is Valencia’s central district for shops, cafe’s and restaurants.
That evening we found a restaurant right near our hotel – the SH Valencia Palace – called Restaurante Cinquecento – an Italian restaurant that didn’t look too impressive from the outside but which was a superb place to eat – friendly, good atmosphere delicious food at reasonable prices, and within about 2-minutes’ walk from the hotel.
Day Four: Valencia Zoo (Bioparc Valencia)
The best day we had in Valencia was our visit to Bioparc Valencia – the large, popular zoo.
We took the underground Metro train there, which was about 25-minutes from our hotel, plus a short walk to the zoo.
Read our separate write-up of the zoo here, in which you’ll see what an amazing place it is – and how worthwhile it is visiting if you’re in Valencia.
Ciudad de Artes & Ciencias
Valencia’s most prominent landmark is the ‘Ciudad de Artes y Ciencias’ – the science museum, which is clearly visible from the plane as you land in Valencia, with its large modern buildings that house a concert hall, an oceanographic centre and the huge science museum.
We’re not necessarily massive fans of museums but, having cycled past the amazing buildings, we wanted to find out what was inside, so we left some time in the afternoon after visiting the zoo to visit the science museum.
Although the building is an impressive sight, we weren’t particularly impressed by the museum itself. The exhibits were a bit underwhelming and there was nothing particularly exciting or interesting there for either adults or the children.
The best feature of the museum is the outside and the photo opportunities of the amazing buildings. Maybe it’s because we’d had such a good time earlier in the day at the Bioparc Valencia zoo that it just didn’t compare very well, but we spoke to another British family who were also in the museum who were complaining that it’d been a bit of a waste of time.
Our thoughts on Valencia for a family city break
Five days was a perfect amount of time to visit Valencia for in our opinion, and we felt we’d seen the majority of what the city had to offer in that time.
We were very lucky with the weather – although, being February, we weren’t expecting it to be amazing, we did at least hope it’d be nicer than the UK, which it definitely was.
The warm, mid-twenties temperatures and sunny, blue sky was a really welcome relief from the long winter back home.
But the day we left the skies clouded over and several days of rain and cooler temperatures were forecast, so you’re obviously not guaranteed this type of beautiful weather at this time of year.
A couple of years ago we visited Barcelona, which isn’t too far from Valencia. We found Valencia to be a bit more of a laid-back city – it’s smaller and felt easier to get around, with a quieter feel to it than Barcelona.
City breaks aren’t usually our favourite type of travel, but we enjoyed this trip and would definitely recommend the city as a great place to spend three to five days in a half-term holiday like this.