The Leicester lad who taught Spain how to drink like a Brit

It is a bold claim, but a likely one: Christopher Wright may well have been the man who taught Spain how to drink - or at least, how to drink like the British. If his establishment wasn't the first authentic British pub in the country, it was certainly the first in the province of Valencia, and a total cultural revolution for the sleepy seaside town of Cullera.

Back in 1959, while the rest of Spain was still sipping sherry in traditional tabernas, a 23-year-old Wright opened The 4A. He possessed that rare pioneer’s instinct - introducing the concept of a "pub" to a nation that couldn't yet pronounce the word. He brought with him a specific brand of British atmosphere: dim lighting, a focus on spirits, and, crucially, a devotion to live music - much as Shelagh Tennant was to do in Torremolinos just a few years later. It was a formula that would eventually rewrite the DNA of the Spanish hospitality industry.

Watching him today, you wouldn’t take him for a nonagenarian. With the upright bearing of an English patrician and a memory that remains razor-sharp, "Mr. Wright" - as he is affectionately known - is a Leicester boy by birth but a Valencian by soul.

He recently toasted his 90th birthday at the Club Turia, not as a passive observer, but as the headline act. Armed with an electric guitar and a mischievous grin, he treated his guests to a setlist of Van Morrison and Country & Western standards, peppered with a bit of Spanish Rumba. "And a little Peret," he adds with a wink, nursing a coffee in a quiet corner of a central Valencia hotel.

Wright’s journey reads like a picaresque novel. He has the uncanny ability of a cat to always land on his feet - fitting, given he seems to have lived at least seven lives.

Before the Mediterranean called, he was a pharmaceutical rep and even a London "bobby." One can easily picture him in a custodian helmet patrolling the foggy London of the 1950s. But an "irreverent streak" eventually got the better of him. In the late fifties, he and a friend set off on an expedition to Spain. He never truly went back. While he still carries a distinct British lilt, he is, for all intents and purposes, a Spaniard.

By the 1970s, Wright had pivoted from publican to power-broker. Acting as an unofficial envoy through the Chamber of Commerce, he bridged the gap between the UK and Spain. If it was Spanish - be it silk, ceramics, jewelry, or citrus - Wright found a buyer for it in the British Isles. When the Ford motor plant opened in Almussafes in 1976, his pub in Cullera became the de facto clubhouse for an international crowd of engineers and expats who craved a taste of home.

His personal life was no less international; he married a woman from Kansas and raised a daughter, Samantha, whom he describes as "half-Valencian, half-guiri" (the Spanish slang for a foreigner). He organised student exchanges for hundreds of local children to learn the "language of Shakespeare" and wrote books on his experiences.

He remains a fixture of the local scene, famously meeting a group of lawyers every week for a lunch that invariably begins with sardines at the legendary Tasca Ángel. When asked for his favorite spot in Spain, he doesn't point to the beach, but to the rugged villages of the Maestrazgo. "It’s the last great Spanish secret," he whispers.

Before he leaves, he pulls a memento from his wallet: a signed photo of Bill Wyman. The Rolling Stones bassist is just one of many who have been charmed by the Englishman who stayed.

As he strides back toward his home in the Abastos district, he dismisses the idea of slowing down with a laugh. "Retired? Never." Impeccably dressed and perfectly composed, Christopher Wright remains what he has always been: an adventurer who realised that while he was born in Leicester, he was always meant to be a Valencian.