Thursday, May 3, 2012

The Castle of Corbera



 To Corbera By Train and Bike

Corbera is a small village to the south of Valencia. It has an old fortress that I wanted to visit so I decided to go there on Sunday. I woke up at 05:00 but then I went back to bed because five o'clock in the morning is too early to get up. I woke up again at eight o’clock. I went to the train station. I showed up at the station at about ten o’clock and I bought a round-trip ticket from the ticket machine. The round-trip ticket on the local train to Alzira costs 6.10€. Usually, a one-way ticket costs more than one half of a round-tip ticket. I got on the train with my bicycle and sat down in my seat. The train left the station in Valencia at exactly 10:23, right on schedule—Spain has excellent trains.

The trip to Alzira from Valencia takes about a half an hour. I got off the train in Alzira and got on my bike. I saw a church at the top of a big hill in Alzira. I wanted to take some pictures of the church so I rode to the top of the hill. The church is called The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lluch, or something like that. From the top of the hill you can see all around the whole area. I like to ride up hills but I am not used to it because I live in Valencia and Valencia is very flat. I prefer to ride uphill than to ride downhill although going downhill is a lot faster. I flew down the hill and asked directions to Corbera.

I rode to Corbera which is only about 8 kilometers from the center of Alzira. There was a lot of traffic on the road because it was Sunday and a lot of people were going to the beach. There are a lot of orange trees in this part of Spain and many big, beautiful mansions. I stopped to take a picture of a mansion called Villa Lola.

Corbera is a small town. It has a small church near the fortress. I rode around the fortress; I was looking for the entrance to the fortress. I found the front gate but it was locked. Unfortunately, the fortress is not open to the public. I went to a café to have a cup of coffee. I was disappointed that I couldn’t go inside the fortress. I would have liked to stand on the high walls of the fortress and to look down on the village. The fortress would have been very easy to defend because the hill is very steep and the walls are very high. My pictures of the castle were very bad. I think that I will go back to Corbera soon to take more pictures.