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Instead of buying expensive paper guides to Valencia, you can simply print them out and read them. Instead of a paid, expensive city tour with a guide, you can use.
Instead of paying for parking within the city (about €15 per day or about €10 for 4 - 5 hours in a parking lot in the city center), you can leave your car in the free Valencia Sud parking lot (right next to the metro station, there is also an above-ground one) , and then take the metro into the city (10 minutes). It will be more profitable if there are only two of you.
* Prices are as of April 2014.
Save on transport
When purchasing tickets for transport in Valencia, keep in mind that ticket card costs 1 €, so buy only one such magnetic ticket, and then charge it for travel. You can buy one such ticket, including for a group of people. The ticket must be kept until the end of the trip; exit from the metro is also required. The cost of a single trip is 1.5 € within 1 zone (centre of Valencia).
If you are going to take the metro once there and back, buy a Return ticket - this will save 10 euro cents (2.90 € instead of 3.00 €).
If you plan to travel a lot by metro (or relatively a lot, but for several people), then it is better to buy a pass right away for 7,20 € for 10 trips - Bonometro - the cost of the trip will be 0.72 € instead of 1.5 € for a one-time trip.
Use bike for trips around the city - the first half hour is free! Then 1 € for every additional 30 minutes. If you travel a lot, you can rent a bike for a week - only 14 €.
From airport: you can walk a little to the next station Rosas metro station(instead of the nearest Xàtiva) - it will be 1 less tariff zone and the ticket will be 2.10 € instead of 3.90 €.
If you really plan to travel a lot by metro, plus visit museums, then it makes sense to buy.
Save on museums
If you plan to visit many museums in Valencia, then it will be cheaper to buy. This is especially beneficial if you are in Valencia for at least 3 days. Then you will pay only 25 €, including transport within the city without restrictions.
To compare prices - the cost of entrance tickets:
With the Valencia Tourist Card, admission is free (not indicated) or discounted.
- Museo Nacional de Ceramica Gonzalez Marti - 3 €
- IVAM Instituto Valenciano de Arte Moderno - 2 €
- Museo de la Ciudad (Palacio de Berbedel) - 2 €
- Museo de La Almoina - 2 €
- Casa Museo Jose Benlliure - 2 €
- Museo Casa de las Rocas - 2 €
- Museo Catedralicio Diocesano - 3 € (-10% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Real Colegio Seminario Corpus Christi El Patriarca - 1.2 €
- CITY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - combined ticket 36.25 € (-15% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Oceanografic - 24.90 € (-15% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Bioparc - 22 € (-15% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Hemisfèric - 8.80 € (-15% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Museo de las Ciencias Principe Felipe (Science Museum) - 8.00 € (-10% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Museo del Gremio de Artistas Falleros - 4 € (-10% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Botanical Garden - 2.5 € (-10% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Tin Soldier Museum - 5 € (-25% with Valencia Tourist Card)
- Museo de Bellas Artes San Pio V - free
- Museo de Prehistoria y de las Culturas de Valencia - free
- Museo Valenciano de la Ilustracion y la Modernidad - free
- Museo Taurino - Plaza de Toros - free
- Museo Convento del Carmen - free
The Kingdom of Spain amazes with the beauty of its unique architectural monuments, which, together with colorful traditions, ancient history and beautiful landscapes, will not leave any tourist indifferent. P. Picasso, S. Dali, A. Gaudi and other famous creators left a huge cultural heritage that annually attracts travelers from all over the world to Spain. When planning a trip to this wonderful country by private car, do not forget that parking in Spain has its own characteristics, without which you can ruin your vacation.
Parking options
In Spain, parking is regulated by local authorities according to legislation set by the government. Various types of signs and special road markings are used to indicate parking restrictions.
There are above-ground and underground parking spaces. Underground parking is usually paid. Ground ones can be either paid or free - they differ in the colors of the road markings.
Parking rules in Spain
As in other countries, in Spain road signs indicating that parking is permitted are rectangular or square in shape, with a white border and the letter “P”.
Parking rules vary depending on the day of the week, time of day or specific week of the month - all this information is indicated on the signs.
If you are traveling in a rented car, you can find the answer to your basic questions in the article: ““.
In some places you must have a permit to park during working hours, called Horas laborables.
In areas marked with a blue or blue line of road markings - zona azul, there are ticket terminals - expendedores de tickets para estacionamiento. Often, next to such markings there is a sign with the image of a hand lowering a coin. When using such parking, the driver is required to buy a ticket and place it under the windshield of the car.
Payment occurs immediately after parking the car. The maximum parking time at one time does not exceed two hours. On weekends and holidays this parking is usually free.
In some cities, zona azul parking lots operate under the Ora Zona system. In this case, parking tickets can be purchased at tobacco kiosks and other retail outlets. They give you the right to park for 30, 60 or 90 minutes.
In coastal areas such as the Costa Brava, parking in the blue zone is free in winter, but in summer there is a charge for longer periods than usual.
There are free parking spaces on the streets of Burgas, Murcia, Salamanca and other popular tourist cities in Spain. If the road markings are white or completely absent, this means that parking is permitted.
A parking zone marked on the road with a yellow line means that parking is prohibited.
A green zona verde or orange zona naranja road marking line indicates the possibility of parking for persons with a special permit or local residents from nearby houses. This is a subtype of the blue parking zone, but in this case residents have advantages over city guests.
Next to such a zone there is a sign with inscriptions that should be read carefully.
A sign that reads “Area Preferent” allows a vehicle to stop for a maximum of two hours. For residents of an area where such parking is available, the cost will be several times lower, while others will have to pay the full amount.
On the sign where it says “Area Preferent”, you also need to look at what hours and on what days you need to pay, and when this is not necessary.
"Area Resident" allows parking exclusively to residents of the area. Their cars have stickers on the windshield of a specific color assigned to a given area. If you are not a resident, then leaving your car there is prohibited.
Sometimes a wheelchair sign may be drawn along with the blue or yellow lines. It indicates the possibility of parking for cars of people with disabilities.
There are also unloading zones where parking is only permitted for unloading and loading for a maximum of 30 minutes. These zones are free and are marked with yellow diagonal lines on the asphalt.
In many cities, private driveways and garage doors have a sign that reads "Prohibido estacionar." Parking in front of this sign is often prohibited. 
In addition, parking is always prohibited in places where there are yellow markings or a solid yellow line on the asphalt, and there is a sign with a crossed out letter E nearby, as well as on:
- highways or toll roads;
- in places where the vehicle blocks the visibility or passage of other vehicles;
- roads intended for cyclists or public transport;
- pedestrian crossings;
- in loading and unloading areas (more than 30 minutes);
- in front of the "Vado Permanente" sign;
- in areas of entry and exit of transport;
- taxi ranks.
You can also leave your car in parking lots in shopping centers or next to the store. As a rule, these are paid parking lots, but in some cases there is no charge. For example, large shopping centers have free afternoon hours, which are extended by purchasing goods in the store for a certain amount. 
In the underground parking lot located next to the shops, conditions are different. It is available to customers absolutely free of charge, provided they make purchases in the store. To take advantage of this offer, you must present your parking receipt at the checkout counter.
Underground paid parking "Parking Publico" is located in commercial and residential buildings and usually occupies several floors (for example, like a multi-storey car park in Malaga). There is a sign at the entrance indicating the number of available seats. The inscription “libre” means that there are free seats, and “ocupado” means that there are no seats.
Parking maps in Spain
Generally, on-street parking in the central areas of major tourist cities or near famous landmarks, such as the Alhambra in Granada, is very limited.
Therefore, to find a parking space, it is better to use special Internet services such as Car Parking Europe or Parkopedia. An interactive map with the exact addresses of parking lots and their tariffs is also available there.
Free parking spaces in big cities are mostly located on the outskirts and are often not marked on maps.
For example, it is almost impossible to find free parking in Barcelona on the map. On the popular Parclick service you will see more than 200 parking lots, but all of them will be paid.
Take a sociological survey!
Cost of parking in big cities
The average cost of parking in the capital of Spain will cost 1.5-3 euros per hour, and the price for 24 hours will be 25 euros and more.
In Valencia, an hour of parking costs 2-3.5 euros, while the cost per day in some parking lots within the city does not exceed 8 euros, while the average price per day in the central part of the city reaches 17-25 euros.
In Seville, an hour of parking costs 1-2 euros. There are also several parking lots where the first hour of parking is free. They will charge an average of 18-20 euros per day.
In the central part of Bilbao, parking price per hour is 2-3 euros, and per day - 16-18 euros.
In Barcelona, an hour of parking costs on average 2-4 euros, and a day - 26-35 euros.
Some car parks, such as the private car park network SABA, offer customers passes for a certain number of days or months. 
Their purchase will allow you to save 80% or more per month, if you take into account the daily cost of parking.
In this case, the private parking space will be designated “plaza reservada” or “reservado”, and no one else will be able to park there.
How to pay for parking
Payment for a parking space in a street parking lot occurs at parking meters, which are located along the parking area. Cash and credit cards are accepted for payment.
The payment system is simple: select the required amount of time, insert a card or throw coins and press the payment button. Sometimes the machines do not provide change, so when using cash you should take care of changing it in advance.
The receipt will indicate until what time you can leave the car. If the paid interval includes free hours, they will be automatically added and taken into account in the time marked on the receipt.
In the underground parking lot at the entrance in front of the barrier, a ticket is taken from a machine. Payment occurs upon return to the car. You need to insert the coupon into the payment terminal, then the amount to pay will be displayed. After this, the terminal will issue a ticket, which is presented at the exit from the parking lot.
A sample parking ticket includes the following information:
- validity date;
- time of leaving the parking lot;
- cost per used parking space;
- payment time;
- coupon number.
Fines
Fines for illegal parking in Spain have increased significantly in recent years. A minor violation of the rules results in a penalty of 100 euros or more (or 20% less for prompt payment).
If the vehicle is towed, an additional towing fee of approximately €100 will apply.
Conclusion
Tourists in Spain who do not know parking rules may encounter difficulties throughout their holiday. Understanding a few basic rules will help you avoid these problems: when parking, you should always pay attention to the road markings and their color along the side of the road, as well as the inscriptions of the signs.
Free parking is available on the outskirts of medium-sized cities, while in large cities such as Madrid and Barcelona they are practically non-existent, so it is better to use paid parking there.
Parking in Spain: Video
From this article I will begin writing reviews about my trip to Valencia (Spanish: Valencia), Spain. About a city that we have long wanted to visit and finally did it in April 2012. Valencia is the third most populous city in Spain after Madrid and Barcelona, the center of the autonomous community of Valencia and the province of the same name. Even though we were in Valencia for only two days, there were enough materials and impressions left for more than one article.
In this particular one, we will first of all talk about various organizational nuances, transport, parking, how to get there, etc., and in the next ones about attractions.
Our arrival in Valencia took place on the evening of April 27, 2012 along the V-21 motorway, also known as the European route E-15. On this trip to Spain we rented a car. How this happened is written in the article "Girona Airport (Aeroport de Girona - Costa Brava), Barcelona, Spain." on our website.
The distance from Girona airport to our hotel in Valencia, according to Google, is 420 kilometers. Travel time from the start at the airport parking lot is about four hours. We drove on a toll Spanish highway, without violating the speed limit.
Tolls on the motorway were paid twice. The first short section from the Girona exit to Barcelona costs €7.0. Further travel around Barcelona is free. The second toll section, the main one, from Barcelona to the exit on V-21 near Valencia cost €31.7. We paid with a Visa card from the Baltic Bank, without any problems. The only caveat is that nothing remains as a memory of the trip along the Spanish highways. The ticket, which is given at the entrance to the toll section, is eaten by the payment machine at the exit; a receipt for payment is not issued.
Valencia, Spain - SH Florazar Hotel and nearby.
Spanish Hotel SH Florazar, where we stayed, is not located in Valencia itself, but in a town or area of the city called Massalfassar. It is 14 kilometers from the center of Valencia, north along the V-21 motorway. The choice of a hotel in this place in Spain was completely deliberate, since it is only five hundred meters from the shore of the Mediterranean Sea. For trips to Valencia we had a car.
The hotel is brand new, modern in appearance and equipment. The hotel has an outdoor swimming pool where in summer you can take a dip or just soak up the Spanish sun on your sun lounger. The hotel has a restaurant and bar where, after a long day of sightseeing in Valencia, you can have lunch or simply enjoy a beer or glass of Spanish wine.
The hotel reception is open 24 hours a day, check-in is from 16-00, check-out is until 12-00. The rooms are large, spacious, three-star equipment with a good plus. The hotel rooms are non-smoking, have air conditioning and a loggia. In addition, the hotel has a conference room, a banquet hall, laundry services, ironing services, an exchange office, car rental, and a tour desk.
At the time of reservation, free Wi-Fi was promised only in public areas of the hotel, and in the rooms Internet was provided for some not very small money. Upon arrival, it turned out that Wi-Fi, and of good quality, is available throughout the entire hotel, including the rooms.
Parking is also free on private territory adjacent to the hotel; pre-order parking is not required, there are plenty of places.
The Mediterranean coast near the hotel turned out to be a sandy but wild beach. There is no complete infrastructure for a beach holiday here yet. But for picky travelers in Spain like us, it worked just fine. In addition, in this part of the coast, an artificial structure, such as a breakwater, was made from large blocks of stone. The length of the breakwater is two hundred meters, if not more, you can walk along it to the very end and look at the coast from the sea.
Next to the hotel there is a huge multi-product shopping complex. We were primarily interested in the Carrefour shopping center, one of the best in Spain, but the complex also includes stores selling furniture, electronics, household appliances and much more. The shopping complex has a huge parking lot. The presence of shopping centers does not bother hotel residents in any way; they are separated from each other by a fence made of a metal fence and dense greenery. For hotel guests, there is a gate in the fence that can be opened with a room key. But if you go to the shopping center by car, you need to make a decent detour, since the entrance to the parking lot is on the opposite side from the hotel.
Something about transport in Valencia, Spain.
As I already wrote, the hotel is located not in Valencia itself, but in the town of Massalfassar. It is 14 kilometers from the center of Valencia, north along the V-21 motorway, but we had a car rented in Barcelona at our disposal.
In such situations, there are two ways to get to the center of Valencia. Firstly, you can just get into the car and drive to the city. Secondly, four kilometers from the hotel, along the CV-32 road, there is a Spanish settlement or town called Museros where there is a metro station.
Remembering how difficult it was to drive around Barcelona (article "Day six - 09/06/2011 - Barcelona (Spain) - the road to the Monastery of Montserrat."), when we were planning a trip to Spain, we first considered the second option. Valencia, with its more than 800 thousand inhabitants, is the third largest city in Spain, which means heavy traffic, hot Spanish drivers and the inevitable search for parking. Besides, a steering wheel and a glass of cold beer (a glass or two of Spanish wine) at lunch or dinner are incompatible things.
The second option involves driving a car to Museros, leaving it in a special parking lot near the metro station and then using public transport in Valencia. Museros metro station is located at Linea 3(red on the metro map), which goes without transfers to the very center of the city. If you take the metro from Museros station, you can get to Xativa or Angel Guimera stations in half an hour. This is where the tour of the old city of Valencia begins.
The metro in Valencia is quite interesting. The total number of lines is six, but two of them bifurcate on one side. One line has an internal ring section, two lines towards the airport run parallel. The number of stations for each line cannot be calculated, since some stations belong to several lines. The total length of the tracks is about 145 kilometers. The scope of the metro is also impressive - if you Google the distance between the extreme stations in the north (Rafelbunyol - Linea 3) and in the south (Villanueva de Castelló – Linea 1 ) then in a straight line it will be almost 65 kilometers.
The fact is that the metro in Valencia is not really a metro; out of 171 stations, only 31 stations are underground, and two lines do not go underground at all. The southern and northern sections of the first metro line were originally commuter train lines, and only in 1988 were they connected by a tunnel running under the city center. Then the construction of new metro and tram lines began, operating in a single connection.
Museros is in the "B" tariff zone of the Valencia metro, while the city center is in the "A" tariff zone. The metro fare system in Valencia is quite varied. You can buy a one-way ticket (Sencillo), for travel in one zone it costs €1.45, for travel within two zones €2.00. You can buy a round-trip ticket (I + V), for travel within one zone it costs €2.60, for travel within two zones €3.60. For two travelers to Spain for one day, this is optimal. Cost as of April 2012, current on the Valencia Metro website.
If there are more than two travelers and you plan to stay in Valencia for more than one day, then you can take a reusable ticket for 10 trips. For travel within one zone it costs €6.60, for travel within two zones €9.90. Such a ticket is valid until a given number of trips is selected and can be used for several people (there is no time limit for activation, like ours). The last statement, however, was not verified for Valencia, but in other cities of Spain (Madrid, Barcelona) the three of us traveled with such tickets, going through the turnstiles in turns.
By car in Valencia, Spain.
Due to the peculiarities that arose when renting a car in Spain, we decided to refrain from leaving it in public, unguarded parking lots, which also include parking lots near metro stations. As it turned out, driving around Valencia by car, although not easy, is still possible, and most importantly it is convenient. The only negative was that we couldn't take the metro.
There is no point in describing the traffic in the city of Valencia; we navigated Spain solely using the navigator. Let me just note once again that the Spaniards drive very correctly. Perhaps, to some very disciplined German or Swiss, the driving style in Spain may seem incorrect, but not to us who go out on the streets of St. Petersburg every day, and even more so to a Muscovite, there is nothing to be afraid of. You will need to be afraid after returning from a trip to Spain to our streets, because you quickly get used to good things and don’t want to get out of the habit.
Yes, there are a lot of cars, but in the city everyone obeys the speed limit, cars drive in their own lanes, without jumping unnecessarily. When changing lanes, they turn on the turn signals and let each other pass. The signs are clean, they are placed on the streets so that they can be seen in advance, there are always markings on the road and they do not contradict the information from the signs. Moreover, some signs are duplicated by being applied to the asphalt surface.
Never in Spain have I heard impatient horns behind me when there was a delay in changing lanes. When I wrote about this about Barcelona, I then thought that our Russian numbers could give us additional advantages in these cases. Like tourists, what can we take from them, but in Valencia in a car with Spanish license plates the picture was the same.
In addition to the peculiarities of driving in circles, there is one more difference between Spanish traffic and ours. In Spain, flashing yellow is a traffic light permitting signal, the same applies to arrows. Once I was delayed in the center of Valencia while making a right turn when the arrow was flashing, and then a Spanish policeman appeared from somewhere, knocked on the glass to draw our attention and indicated with his hand “turn.”
Well, at the end of this introductory article about Valencia, I’ll write a little about parking. When planning a trip to Valencia, we encountered the fact that for some reason Google was not processing requests for parking. The false conclusion was drawn that parking in Valencia is not very good. It turned out that this was not the case. Yes, it’s almost impossible to just park a car in the city center, especially for free. But the whole city is simply dotted with underground parking lots. It seems that under every more or less significant square in the city center there is its own parking lot and on more than one level. And these days the entire area of the Central Market was dug up, a grandiose underground construction of a parking lot was launched there, which will have at least four levels for parking.
During two days of walking around Valencia, we left the car in two paid underground parking lots and once in a free surface parking lot, not in the city center. Our first parking was in the underground parking lot under Placa de Vila-Rasa. This square is not even indicated on Google, although it is located two blocks from the Central Market (Mercado Central). For those interested, in order to find this square and, accordingly, parking on Google, look for Calle de Beluga. The navigator led us there, although this parking lot was not in the navigator either; we were driving to the parking lot under the Central Market, but missed the turn, and then we saw signs.
The methodology for calculating the cost of parking in Spain is interesting - it is per minute, but with a complex calculation logic. For example, the first minute in this parking lot cost €0.05, then look at the sign posted next to the parking payment machine. If you wait an hour, you will pay €2.65, if you wait two hours, €4.65, if you wait three hours, €6.70. We stood for about three and a half and paid €8.20. Payment at the end of parking, according to the ticket received upon entry.
When using underground parking lots in Spain, you should remember that they are not easy to maneuver. This applies to both entry and exit with steep descents, ascents and ninety-degree turns, as well as the parking lot itself. Parking spaces in Spain are marked for cars of class “C” at best, i.e. under Volkswagen Golf, Opel Astra or Ford Focus. It will be difficult for anyone who has a car anymore. We rented an Opel Meriva; the car was slightly longer than the Astra, and in the parking lot it extended beyond the length of the row.
The second underground parking lot was under the Valencia Zoo, which is called “Bioparc”. Here the parking price is more reasonable; for the same almost four hours we paid only €5.00. But free parking was found at the “City of Science and Arts” (Ciudad de las Artes & las Ciencias). True, we were lucky, usually there are human specimens of a non-Spanish species (I don’t know what to call them politically correct) near the free parking spaces and waving their hands, like “come here, there’s a free space.” We passed several and successfully stood in an empty place, where such a specimen, apparently, was distracted or simply did not have time to fill the vacant space.
As you can see, the trip to Valencia left us with only pleasant memories from an organizational point of view.