But if there’s one thing that sums up the relationship that this city has with water in its myriad forms, then it’s the sleepy beachside district where I’m staying: El Cabanyal. "It’s an area with a lot of history. It was a fishing village and many people worked here in jobs related to the sea: at the port, fishing or with customs," explains Marga Alcalá, who heads up tour company Paseando por los Poblados de la Mar and has been running neighbourhood tours for the past six years.

The area feels totally different from the rest of the city: low-rise terraced buildings that are distinctively tiled, offering variegated bursts of colour in the gridded streets. "All the houses here are a result of the old barracas – huts in the traditional style of Valencia," she explains. "They wanted to avoid the humidity, and it was less expensive to tile the house than to paint it every year. Most of the houses are tiled in blue, white or green. It’s related to the jobs of those who live there: the colour of the sea or the colour of the boats – boats in Valencia were painted green and white."