I recently read a post on one guy's travel blog which brought up the notion of keeping some things to yourself while traveling. At one point in Costa Rica he and his travel crew saw a group of extremely rare birds, a sighting which he kept to himself: "I didn't tweet it, flick it, post it, stumble, or dig." He goes on to explain that he found it exhilarating to be selfish with his time, keeping the moment to himself rather than focusing on capturing the moment to share with others...which leads me to my point. I took quite a few pictures of my trip to Valencia this weekend, but I think more to show that I'd been there than anything else. Some of my favorite moments of the trip were preserved on someone's camera, just not mine. Plus, given the state of my camera, I'm not very encouraged to take pictures anyway.
This weekend I went to Valencia with a group of friends from my school to experience the cultural phenomenon known as Las Fallas. Las Fallas is a festival in which all the different barrios of Valencia (and beyond) spend months out of the year preparing their falla, usually a satire on a certain theme, with characters, animals, you name it, sometimes standing as tall as entire apartment buildings. During the festival, the city comes to life in an extremely boisterous manner with fireworks exploding every thirty seconds or so, ranging from magnificent displays of color and light to small petardos flying from the hands of small children and, more frequently, old Valencianos. Each afternoon of the festival has a mascletà, in which dozens of fireworks are lit and the Plaza de Ayuntamiento shakes and explodes with celebration; each day ends and the nights begin with a fireworks display over the river, the most impressive of which being on the night of the 18th of March, or La Nit del Foc, which fortunately got to experience--definitely one of the best fireworks shows I've seen. After we fought through the crowds which gathered to watch the display, we spent some time walking around Valencia to see as many of the fallas as we could before calling it a night around 5am. What most surprised me was how we could walk around quite calmly all night with the other thousands of people that had come to town for the weekend and not feel like we were staying out until an absurd hour. Regrettably, on our cab ride back to the hostel, our taxi driver informed us that Friday was the party night because after the fallas burn on the 19th, the festival is over and everybody goes home.
Saturday we all met around noon to have breakfast (I love Spain) and to make our way back into the center to experience the Mascletà. Unfortunately, we didn't plan very well and arrived only with enough time to hear the explosions, but not to feel them. I am pretty bummed that we missed this, as every single person who offered Valencia advice told me that the Mascletà was an obligatory part of Las Fallas que no se puede perder. After the Mascletà madness was over, we continued our walk around town to see many more fallas and have a late lunch. We then began our walk back toward the hostel and came across one of the many parades, this time with fire and people dressed as demons! It was considerably shorter than the other parades, but still very impressive.
Saturday night, however, was the end of the festival, and a big festival can only come to a close with an even bigger ending. Las Fallas always ends with all the fallas being set on fire. Around 10pm, the fallas infantiles are burned and then later, any time from 12-4am, the full-size fallas are set ablaze. We stuck around the second prize winner to watch it burn, and wow was it worth it. This falla was as tall as the apartments that surrounded it, and the flames reached even higher. We didn't stand close for the actual burning, but once it had burnt down until only the interior support beams remained, we advanced to feel the heat and take some pictures. Our night continued to look for some remainder of a fiesta, but as the taxi driver correctly predicted, there really were none. The music in the streets ceased and all that remained were charred bits of falla scattered throughout the botellón-filled streets. We called it a night around 430am and went back to the hostel.
On Sunday, Ángel and I managed to get out of the hostel around noon to spend an hour or so lying on the beach, taking in the warmth and eventually sticking our feet in the chilly Mediterranean. But what followed the beach was incredible...paella valenciana! I will admit, I was a bit apprehensive about eating rabbit at first, but as long as I just didn't think about whether I was eating rabbit or chicken, I didn't mind and actually quite liked it. Our delicious lunch lasted a few hours and we eventually hit the road back to Madrid around 6pm, only hitting traffic just outside Valencia.
One big Spanish tradition down... up next, Semana Santa in Sevilla? San Fermín? La Tomatina? Vamos a ver...
