Elche
Located 23 kilometres from Alicante is the Spanish coastal city of Elche (or Elx in Valencian). Outside of Valencia itself, Elche is the largest city in the Valencia region, with a population of 234,765.
Elche is bursting with fascinating sights, from the UNESCO World Heritage site Palmeral de Elche with thousands of palm trees to the Rio Safari animal park.
The Arabs founded the city in the tenth century. When they built it from scratch, they surrounded their vision of civilisation with palm trees. These trees are still abundant in the centre and are therefore strictly forbidden to be cut down. This gives the city of Elche an exotic character. The Arabs also built an irrigation system to grow date palms, one of the few examples of Arab agriculture in Europe.