Dalt Vila

We woke up on Sunday morning with a plan to head out to Ibiza Town, where we could explore the older bit known as Dalt Vila.

J was pretty excited because we heard there was a castle thereabouts, but that's not exactly true. What you do get see is a walled city and the Catedral - not too shabby. Interesting bit of information: the city was established in 7th century B.C. Craziness!

Anyway, we stuffed ourselves at the amazing breakfast buffet and headed into town. It was a short 15 minute walk to Dalt Vila, and we were in the city.

Because the high season had ended, a lot of the shops were shut and J and I spent most of our time roaming through the mostly deserted streets.

 

We could see the Catedral and the walls high above us, and we started the slow and winding way up.

 

I wasn't quite sure how to get there, but I figured we were fine so long as we were on a steady incline. And there were inclines. Lots of them. And stray cats. Lots of them. Words for the wise: the stones are slippery and the slope is steep so definitely wear your walking shoes!

 

 
 

Every time I thought we had reached the top, we came across another slope to climb.

Although it was a tiring walk uphill, we saw lots of interesting sights along the way. I was enamored with Ibiza's charming doors - they're quite small and have a small window in the middle with a metal grill covering the glass.

 

 

  

 

 

We finally reached the top, and the view and the breeze made it completely worth it.

 
 

 

We also got to take a quick look at the Catedral, which happened to be shut. Boo.

After enjoying the view for a bit, we decided to head back down into town for some lunch. It was only after we made it out of the walled city that we discovered that we had entered it from the rear. The front entrance was fine as front entrances go, but it wasn't one of those knock your socks off kind of entrances.

 

We were pretty hungry so we quickly grabbed a table at the pizza place right by the entrance of the walled city, even though I was wary of eating "tourist food." I was really surprised when I took a bite of my pizza - it was delicious! J and I happily munched away on our food as we watched the open air market in front of us. Because it was no longer the high season, there weren't that many people about.

After lunch, there wasn't much left for us to do since most of the shops were shut so we decided to head back to the hotel. We didn't need to be at the airport for another hour or so, so J and I decided to chill out in the hotel's library. I chilled and read magazines while J took a cat-nap.

Soon, we were off to the airport and on our flight back to London.

Turning thirty doesn't seem so bad when you get to do it in Ibiza. =)

Hello Ibiza, Goodbye Twenties

I never thought I'd see the day, but here I am on the eve of entering my thirties. I should've paid more attention to the clock because I can't figure out where the time went!

But I can figure out that the twenties ought to go out with a bang, rather than a whimper, so J and I planned a weekend away in Ibiza, Spain to celebrate.

I've heard of Ibiza before and its crazy party scene, but I was much more excited about the surf and sun since it's gotten downright freezing in London in the last week.

J and I woke up ridiculously early on Friday morning to catch a minicab to London City airport, where we boarded our 2 hour flight to Ibiza. In a few short hours, we were touching down on the island and I could see that it would be clear, blue skies and warm sun for the day. Hooray!

We hopped into a taxi and arrived at our hotel for the weekend. Since a girl doesn't turn 30 every day, we decided to splurge a bit on the Ibiza Gran Hotel, a five star hotel, which was close to both the airport and to Ibiza Town.

The hotel lobby was absolutely enormous in comparison to the hotels I've gotten used to in Europe, and I was just amazed by the design of the hotel. It's only four years old, and it's got a very modern and minimalist feel to it. A really clean scent was being pumped throughout the hotel, and the place smelled just like how I would imagine heaven to smell.

Which made sense because our hotel room was pretty heavenly. It was a deluxe suite, and some of the features included a jacuzzi on the terrace, a whirlpool tub, two plasma TVs and a view of both the pool area and the marina.

 

 

The hotel was so amazing and we were pretty tired from getting up so early that I made the executive decision that we would be lounging about the hotel all day and taking some time to enjoy the pool.

Although the entire hotel was fully booked, there were only a few people out in the pool area. J and I took advantage to splash around in the adult pool and generally cause a ruckus when we weren't napping on the giant daybed. It was great - it's been way too long since I've cannonballed.

All the horseplay made us pretty hungry, and we went in search of food, but to our surprise, none of the restaurants were open. Apparently, the onsite restaurant wouldn't open until 8:30pm, and we were way to hungry to wait 2 hours for dinner.

Have I mentioned that room service is a godsend? J and I always love ordering room service, and this trip was no exception. We had ordered room service for lunch, and we ordered it again for dinner. It looked like we were collecting trolleys or something in our suite.

We ended the night with J watching BBC World News, which was the only English speaking channel the hotel had, and I was re-reading Bill Bryson's At Home.

All in all, it was a really nice way of easing into a relaxing holiday.