Explorer Valence

Valencia's Mercado Central is a covered food market designed by Alexandre Soler March and Francesc Guàrdia and built between 1914 and 1928 in Valencian Art Nouveau style. Under its iron-framed domes and tiled walls, more than 8,000 m² of floor hold stalls selling fruit, vegetables, meat, fish and local produce. It faces the Lonja de la Seda.

Mestalla Stadium is the home ground of Valencia CF, opened on 20 May 1923 and named after a historic irrigation canal. It holds about 49,400 spectators in steep stands close to the pitch, hosted matches of the 1982 World Cup and is the oldest stadium in La Liga. Guided tours visit the press room and the players' dressing room.

Bioparc Valencia is a 10-hectare zoo at the western end of the Turia gardens, owned by the city and opened in 2008 to replace the old municipal zoo. It focuses on African wildlife, shown in recreated savannah, equatorial forest, wetland and Madagascar habitats where rivers, ponds and rocks rather than bars separate the animals from visitors.

L'Oceanogràfic is the aquarium of Valencia's City of Arts and Sciences, opened in 2003 at the eastern end of the former Turia riverbed. Its buildings, including the restaurant roofed by Félix Candela's concrete shells, house about 45,000 animals of 500 species in zones for the Mediterranean, the Arctic, tropical seas and the Red Sea, plus a dolphinarium.