Close to the heart of the summer I'm leaving beautiful Valencia behind heading to my next destination: Alicante. The first 50km are rather boring but that's not the main issue - that's the fact that it smells like shit. Literally. Blame cow industry for that. Top WTF time. It fortunately gets better and more scenic later with quite nice temperatures close to Mariola and Maigmo mountains. Speaking of temperatures there's a terrible heatwave about to arrive and I already think about spending my time somewhere high at Nevada till it cools down a bit. Right now is still OK and allows me to enjoy a pleasant city like Alicante. Part of "pleasant" belongs to my wonderful friend Mar who hosts me at the top floor of her sweet house with enough space for me and my iron horse. I also had a balcony with view at my exclusive disposal:

The other part of "pleasant" belongs to Alicante's location. This city is designed for swimming being surrounded by sea and long beaches. It's funny to see a vast part of the local population walking around in swimsuits through the day. I rush to taste the whole thing myself:

As you can see it is impressive to be able to swim or sunbath with no one around in a radius of 30m during high season in a city! Sweet.

Time to explore the city so I take the tram. I avoid public transportation when I explore cities but I was staying several kms away from the center at the East new part of the city so I had to make an exception.

Enjoy the tram ride:

Looking the city through the tram's windows I am firstly impressed by those ultra high buildings. Looks to me like during the 70s they had a skyscraper boom. I mean...

Ugly? Impressive? Interesting? A bit of all together. The location of Alicante is so privileged that the above pharaonic giants of concrete cannot spoil this charming city. The latter was celebrating the beginning of the summer - see the result in the following images:

This cross between kitschy and funny put a smile on my face during my extended walk around the city's center. Kinda liked it :) Not sure this guy did though:

Bulls on parade, definitely not from Rage Against the Machine:

I am always attracted by the persisting nature in the heart of cities:

A walk around Alicante's Marina is definitely a must:

This statue of a surfer is a nice idea well executed:

And when you turn your back to the sea this is how the city looks like:

At this point I must admit that the impressive clarity of sunlight I experience at Alicante can only be compared to the one in Athens. I was so impressed that I looked at the map and..yes...my guess was right: these two cities share the same latitude.

As I walk by the sea close to the local Casino I spot an amazing time machine vessel. Deserves several shots:

Alicante has plenty of choices for swimming - Playa del Postiguet is among the most crowded ones:

Same goes for San Juan Playa on the East end of the city:

A visit at the local archaeological museum was later proposed by my friend and host Mar so it was time for some air conditioned history in this beautiful building:

Curious how it looks inside? Have a bite:

I am lucky to spend my days at Alicante in bearable temperatures while the rest of South Spain is under insane heatwave. I mean, even here I had to sleep out in the balcony one night but still better than trying to survive at humid Granada in low 40sC. The forecast denied to change so I had to change plans and avoid Seville, Granada & Cordoba, all of them frying at the moment. I'd follow the coast instead making my way to Portugal step by step.

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