Elche: Town of Palmtrees

by Tammy Hudson and Courtney Wood Friday, Oct 31st, we attended the Alicante Step by Step Activity to the town of Elche. We first went to the Parque Municipal, one of the largest palm tree parks in the city, considered the biggest in Europe with more than 300.000 palm trees all over the city of Elche. After the park, we toured a 17th century church that was formerly a Mosque. While in Elche, the city hosted its annual Medieval Market that occurs in November. The food looked and smelled so amazing that a few of us decided to return the next day to sample... everything! A few of our favorites were the hot bread fresh out of the oven, goat cheese, kebabs, crepes and chorizos. We also had the opportunity to watch a play called “Misterio de Elche” at the main Church of Santa Maria. This is a traditional mystery play that dates back to Medieval Times. We were very fortunate to see be able to see it, as it only occurs in summer and every other November. Overall, this was the last Alicante Step by Step Tour we had for our study abroad semester with CEA, but thanks to CEA, we were exposed to different towns not far from Alicante that we wouldn't have discovered on our own. We were taken to all these places that had their particular and interesting Mediterranean characteristics; and also opened our eyes for other Alicante Step by Step Activities that we could start doing on his own.