USAC Day Trip Around the Costa Blanca

Yesterday we went on a USAC day trip to 3 towns in the Costa Blanca: Javea, Denia and Altea. We left at 9 am and took a bus to Javea for a little over an hour. In Javea we hiked to the top of a cliff to get beautiful views of Cabo San Antonio (cape of san antonio) below. It was a really nice hike! Javea is a lot more green than Alicante so we actually got to walk through trees and shade which was a nice change of pace. The hike took about 45 minutes and the views were totally worth it.

USACers hiking to the top



Beautiful Cabo San Antonio in Javea



roomies plus steph and corey at the top!



beach in Javea

After we finished the hike we took a 20 minute bus ride to Denia. In Denia we walked around the town - it was really cute and had lots of great shops. Then we had lunch (provided by usac!) At a Paella restaurant. I didn't have high hopes for this meal since we were a huge group (80 of us) but i definitely underestimated it! We had a full course meal - bread, esalada valenciana, tortilla, croquetas de jamon y queso, grilled veggies, HUGE servings of Paella and chocolate and vanilla icecream for dessert. They just kept bringing more and more food out it was awesome!

Side note: Denia had a store called Ale Hop (they are ALL over spain, including in Alicante) That carries the most random ridiculous items. its kind of like a 5-below (without the good prices) combined with a spencers) My favorite items they are currently selling are scented babies. They have an enormous display of scented babies, both black and white! The white ones all smell like "baby scent" while the black ones smell like ... chocolate. I wish I could say I was making this up. I also wish I could buy them for everyone as souveniers but they are a littleeeee bit bulky for my suitcase. Hopefully a picture will do.

I also love how most of the black babies have
crooked/backwards/upsidedown visors.. seriously?

After Denia we went to our last stop, Altea, which had a town similar to Santa Cruz but bigger. We climbed to the top of the town and got some good views of the sea, the white houses and the cliff we climbed in Javea. Afterwards we headed home - it was a long day and everyone was so exhausted.

window in Altea