4/24/22 Second Day in Valencia

 We were originally supposed to be on our way to our next port today, but about a month before the tour started, Morocco changed their entrance requirements and so Tangier was removed from our itinerary (no big deal since we had been there in 2014) and a second day in Valencia was substituted. The plan was to take us to the Lladro factory but a last minute visit to the factory by government officials left the guide team scrambled. We ended up at a ceramics museum. I had assumed it would be oriented toward the history of ceramics and how they were made, but it was more of a kind of random collection of ceramics. 

The museum is house in a former palace which fell into disrepair with the collapse of the silk market and was remade with some significant changes to accommodate the museum.

The entry is an elaborate alabaster sculpture.

This side represents the wealth from
the Americas (there's a crocodile
in there somewhere)

This side represents the wealth from
Asia with the lion at the base.

The entry courtyard now has a glass roof

An example of the elaborate type of
carriage the family would have had.

In addition to all types of ceramics here, there also
several ornate furniture pieces.

This tapestry is several hundred years old and original
to the mansion. It has undergone an extensive
renovation due to the bad condition it was found in.

A main  bedroon

Another expensive ceiling.

Our trip leader, Marcel, posing with his doppleganger

The mirror behind this plate lets you
see the decorations on the back.

The original beams from the mansion. The
first one is the oldest, the next set is from
a later era, and somewhere there was a
third type I didn't see.

This odd looking dish has a hole or two along the rim so
that a man shaving could hang it around his neck and
drip into the bowl instead of the sink or the floor..

This is the mockup of a kitchen, which in real life would
be on the ground floor. It shows the variety of ceramics
that the kitchen might use.

This plate looked very Mexican to us.

Even the front of the stairs were decorative.

All the furniture in this room had ceramic
framing. It was not meant to be used, but
to show off the family's wealth.

The grand ballroom

After the Ceramics Museum, we walked around a bit before returning to a quiet afternoon on the ship. Marcel pointed out this plaque on the ground and explained the significance of the bat at the top. This area had been taken over by the Moors in the 1000s and later, King James set out to take it back. There was a siege and two different stories are told about the significance of the bat. In one, the bat woke King James early and led him to attack early. In the other version, the bat told him where there was a weak spot in the wall for him to attack.

Back on the ship, we decided to relax and to try to get current with this blog. We enjoyed the uncommon time to just lay about and took advantage to photograph the sunset.