Walking tours, a beach trip and a visit to Europe’s largest aquarium – St Helen’s and Abingdon School Sixth Form students joined up for a Spanish study trip to Valencia over the Easter holidays that was filled with history and culture. Josie (L6D) shares her memorable moments.
‘I think it is safe to say that everyone on the Valencia trip thoroughly enjoyed themselves; the seven days absolutely flew by, action-packed with a huge variety of activities which combined having fun in the Spanish city with lots of Spanish-speaking practise.
Most days we did lessons in the morning followed by activities in the afternoon, ranging from cycling tours around the city and visiting an aquarium, to a treasure hunt-style competition which involved interviewing strangers to find out facts and racing to various locations around the city to take photos. A lot of Google Maps was involved with our interviewees, often looking slightly confused with our strange enquiries about random historical saints of Valencia!
After a busy day in Valencia, we would make our way back to our host families, where we stayed in groups of 2–4 people, and enjoyed a very slow walk in the evening sun after the tiring day. We were overwhelmed by the kindness of our host families who we formed great bonds with, despite the odd moment at dinner when we would be slightly lost by a Spanish joke and just laugh along through the confusion. They made our trips very special by welcoming us into their families with so many hugs and our host families’ children entertaining us with long games of Jenga after dinner – tears were shed from both sides when we had to part…
We all feel our Spanish speaking has come along leaps and bounds since the trip, particularly as English was not an option whenever we were out or with our host families. We are so grateful for the opportunity to have gone on this trip, and we can all agree that it was an inolvidable (unforgettable!) trip!’
