My 60th Birthday and our Dinner Party - Saturday, February 18th and Sunday, February 19th, 2017

Saturday, February 18th

I have to imagine that some people, like I did, wake up on their 60th birthday and have a hard time believing they are 60.  The good news is, mostly, I don't feel old.  Well maybe a little after my trainer has worked me hard for the 5th consecutive day when my legs and arms are tired.  But I feel fortunate that my overall feeling, spirit and in my heart and soul I feel young.  

I think spending this year in Spain, trying to learn a new language has further helped me to think and feel younger.  The excitement of discovering new places, experiencing new rituals, traditions and festivals, new people, customs, let alone the challenge of studying again and trying to speak Spanish, has definitely helped me to "work" my brain!

There is no question I feel sad that we were not home with all of our family and friends to celebrate my 60th.  We like to have parties and I know celebrating my 60th would have been a blast.  That's life right, "you can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes well you just might find you get what you need".  It was nice to have so many email messages and photos and cards from friends at home.  The photo with me and my Thousand Oaks buddies - can you guess which afro studded dude is me?

We all started off the day by taking The Stelluto's to the Central Market.  Below is a 4 minute YouTube video of the Central Market.

From the Central Market we walked down Calle Caballeros, one of the historic streets of Valencia.  The group went into a Chinese store to buy somethings I walked next door to admire a few of the Slow Motion paper mache art pieces in Rostro Foto Studio by Gerald Kiernan.  We have admired them a number of times and kept thinking we might buy some.  Well Gerald was just closing the shop, but he kept it open and we bought one.  Here it is "hanging out" from our shelves!

It turns out he had another piece of art, a statue, that we feel in love with.  It is small enough for us to carry home, so we bought it.  We haven't received it yet so no photo's at this time.

We brought the Stelluto's to Quart Towers

We went to have a calamari sandwich.  But we should know better by now, never eat jut before a restaurant closes (4:00).  We did not get the sandwich, but poor calamari, shrimp, tortilla, etc.  not the greatest snack we've every had.  We then went home to  relax a little before our dinner party tonight.

Before we left the house, for our dinner party, the men had a Johnny Walker Black scotch.

Beth arranged the party at our favorite Italian restaurant Lambrusqueria, we had 27 people from around the world.

Susan with the 60th ballons

Beautiful table set up

Me with my diamond studded glasses and my King crown with Jorge and Ferni 

Dale (with the book he gave me -- 1000 must know words in Spanish)  with Patricia and Ricardo in the back ground

Maria Marin with her baby 

Ferni, then John (he gave me the King crown because I found the King in my piece of King's cake earlier in the year) followed by Francisco, the temporary King and Isabel who is Francisco's wife, then Chiara.

We had excellent food, wonderful company and everyone had a nice time meeting new people and celebrating.

Sunday, February 19th

Nathan wearing the Warriors hat Jorge and Ferni gave me and my glasses from Dale having fun!

Later in the day we took the Stelluto's to their first ever Fútbol match, it was Valencia vs. Athletic Club Bilbao.

We asked Nathan if he knew any Valencia fútbol players and he said he knew Luís Carlos Almeida de Cunha known as NANI.  We were surprised he knew anyone but he told us it was because he plays a FIFA video game and Nani was on is team, I think.

This was my 3rd Valencia fútbol match this season....Valencia is having a terrible season and they lost my previous 2 games.  But TODAY was different.  Not only did Valencia win, but the first ever GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLLLLL
that Nathan ever saw was scored by none other than NANI, how's that for a unique story!  Here are the highlights of our game.

BTW we gave Nathan a Valencia fútbol shirt for his Birthday and I wore mine.  Here are some photo's from the game

David, Susan and Beth coordinated to make me my favorite chocolate cake with whipped cream, great way to finish my Birthday weekend.

Nuestros cuñado, cuñada y sobrino llegaron - (The Stelluto's) - Thursday, February 16 & 17

Thursday, February 16th, 2017
David, Susan and Nathan Stelluto arrived today from Boston, MA. 
They took the over night flight and arrived in Valencia at 11:20am. With jet lag setting in we knew that we would take a short walk, have some lunch and then return home in order to get a good nights sleep.

We took them to the Petit Bistro on the rooftop of the Cathedral Suites Hotel.  It was a relatively warm day so we ate outside with a city view and enjoyed the sunshine.

Friday, February 17th
It was a gorgeous day and we have been wanting to visit the BioPark so we all decided to go today.  We all had a fantastic day and enjoyed it very much, here are a few photo's of our experience.

I put this photo in so you can see that the BioPark is not far from the city of Valencia!

For dinner we took them to try Morroccan food at a restaurant we have enjoyed in the past called Almunia.  We arrived a few minutes before our 8:30 pm reservation and it was not open.  We probably sat down to eat at about 9:00 pm....it's Spain.  We each had the inclusive meal, starters of hummus, pita bread, a veggie dish and some falafels.  Then we had two different couscous dishes, one chicken and one beef.  After that we had a Tajine, it was all SO much food we took it home to have another dinner!

La Traviata - Wednesday, February 15, 2016

Wednesday, February 15

Last night we went to the Palacio de las Artes Reina Sofia to see La Traviata.  The show was amazing. It think it was due to two main performances.  First from Marina Rebeka, who played the main part of Violetta Valéry.

This is a YouTube video of Marina Rebeka at the Met singing one of the songs from La Traviata.  The set and clothes in our show last night were more historical and classic then what she is wearing in this modern take of La Traviata, but her voice is just amazing.

  
BUT the real reason we choose to see the show was because Plácido Domingo was in it, he was wonderful.  In this YouTube Plácido Domingo sings a La Traviata song along with Luciano Pavarotti & José Carreras, enjoy!

Javier Paris - Once owned the World Record for the fastest time in the 2 X 2 Rubix cube - Tuesday, February 14th

Tuesday, February 14th

Happy Valentine's Day to all! 💙💚💛💜

Our doorman's name is Javier Paris.  We are now able to have short conversations with him, which is a huge improvement from when we arrived.  If he's not reading or cleaning or helping people, who live in our apartment building, he is working on his many different types of Rubix cubes.  I tried to look up exactly how many different types of Rubix cubes there are but I couldn't find that answer. However here is the history of the Rubix cube

I have known for some time that Javi, at one time, held the World Record for the 2 by 2 Rubix cube in 1.63 seconds.   What I did not know is that it was captured on YouTube....so here it is!

I did look up what the current worlds record is, I believe it is 0.49 of a second....it almost seems impossible.

Kim and Erwan are visiting from Müchen - Friday, February 10 to Monday, February 13, 2017

Friday, February 10th
We are so excited to have Kim and Erwan visit us for the weekend. We have come to love Valencia.  We feel a sense of pride as though it is "our" city. In a sense it is "our" city, we did chose to live here for a year.  We have learned a lot about the history of this city and there is a lot to be proud of, here is the singing of the Regional Anthem of Valencia, which we happen to love.

With Kim and Erwan arriving in the late afternoon, we had a typical lunch ready for them at our apartment.  Jámon, queso, pan with red wine.  After our snack we took them on our usual "walk around the block" - down to the plaza de toros (bullring), into the Estacíon del Norte (North train station).  This Carnival hat/dress was on display 

We then walked to Ayuntamiento (City Hall Plaza) and to Plaza de la Renia.  We took a slight detour to show them the narrowest building in Europe 107 centimeters or 42 inches

Along the way we went into the Real Basílica de Nuestra Señora de los Desamparados as they were having Friday night services. Here they are in the Plaza de la Virgen.

We were not allowed into Church of San Nicolas, known as the Sistine Chapel of Valencia. As we think they were having a private memorial.

We then headed over to the Ruzafa area to have dinner in Mood Food.  We all enjoyed our meal.  

I like this Valenica IPA VIPA beer 

We were glad we had the first reservations at 8:30pm as there was a line outside the door when we left at close to 11:00!!!

Saturday, February 11th
It was supposed to rain today, a 100% chance, however we got lucky and it did not rain.  So we walked down to the Rio Turía park and from there to the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias (The City of Arts and Science) as we went to see the Exhibition of the Ninot 2017.  We each had to vote on one Infintil and one adult Ninot that we want pardoned, so it won't get burned during this years Fallas. Here are a "few" photo's of my favorite Ninots.  BTW there are over 500 Ninot's in this exhibit.  They started work on these months ago!

I voted to "Pardon" this adult Ninot

Beth voted to "Pardon" this Infintil Ninot

Even one of the person who shall not be named holding rockets with named Moors, Torture and 

After we went to see The Valencia Cathedral.  This Cathdral has THE HOLY GRAIL, which I posted about a few days ago.

Here are a few other photo's of the Cathedral.

The Chapel of one of the Patron Saint of Valencia Saint Vicent Martyr, including HIS ARM!!!

Sunday, February 12
This morning we had a quick visited to the González Martí National Museum of Cermamics and Decorative Arts.  We then visited the Llotja de la Seda, the Silk Exchange.  

From here we walked through barrio del Carmen and then to Torres de Serranos (Serranos Towers).  

At the Torres Serrano, a family in Fallas outfits 

We then went to the La Malvarrosa beach.  We went to Hotel Neptuno to eat paella at their Trident Restaurant.

Everyone was tired so we all decided to stay at home and watch Invictus.

Kim and Erwan left on Monday morning!