Valencia Marathon Trinidad Alfonso

On the Ground

December in Valencia is the Mediterranean's best argument against everything you thought winter was supposed to be: eighteen degrees, actual sun, orange trees lining the streets with oranges that are not decorative. The paella here is a completely different dish from what gets served everywhere else under that name, and the Valencians will tell you this, repeatedly, and they are right. The Turia Garden — a nine-kilometer park built in a former riverbed after a catastrophic flood — runs through the city like a wound that healed into something better than what was there before. Dinner at ten is not affectation; it is simply when people eat. Adjust your clock before you arrive.