A Day Trip to Valencia: Las Fallas

After a 6 am wake-up time, my friend and I headed to Moncloa. We needed to meet our friend and get our tour bracelets before the buses left at 7:15 for Valencia.

It was a groggy morning because I had spent most of the previous night out. My friend and I went to eat, tried to play pool at an Irish bar, and headed back to his place, which gave us only six hours to sleep before we had to get up. I decided it was a chocolate napolitana day, so I grabbed one at the petite café in the Moncloa metro station. My friend bought a small sandwich instead.

Once we spotted our friend and got our bracelets, we boarded the bus with all the energy and enthusiasm that we could muster at 7 am. I took a window seat with a particularly stubborn, Portuguese girl who decided that she wouldn’t get up to let me pass. Instead, I had to climb over her. Ugh, there is nothing more annoying than a person who won’t get up to let you sit down. As if their seat would be stolen from underneath them by getting up for a few seconds. Anyways, I ignored the girl, got some sleep, and four and a half hours later, arrived in the city.

Valencia. I don’t know how best to describe it. It’s a city located on the east coast, approximately a 4 ½ -hour bus ride from Madrid and a 2-hour bus ride from Alicante. The old city doesn’t touch the coast, but rather does touch a long dried-up river bed which used to flow into the sea. Now, it serves as an athlete’s dream park and a relaxing reprieve from the hustle and bustle of urban life.

There is almost everything that you could want in Valencia: a spacious and crowded central market hosting plenty of fresh produce, breads, dried fruits and meats; a plethora of little and big plazas which capture the vibe of each neighborhood; lots of eye-catching and intriguing architecture; a sizeable beach with plenty of space to drop your towel and sunbathe; plenty of good food and historic and natural sites; and the Holy Grail if you can believe it.

It’s hard to capture the essence of a place in so few words, but Valencia is one of those cities which makes me fall in love with Spain every time I visit. When I feel like I don’t belong anymore or I’m losing interest, I just need to see Valencia (or Segovia) to be reminded why I can’t live without Spain. It casts a spell on me and brings me back to falling head-over-heals in love with this great country.

What we also came to see last Saturday was Las Fallas festival. For those who don’t know, Las Fallas is a Valencian festival celebrated every year in March, finishing on Saint Joseph’s Day (the 19th). At the end, they celebrate the “cremá”, which is the burning of the paper maché and wooden Fallas. Most people spend the time: drinking and eating with friends and family, dancing in the streets, admiring the sculptures, listening to music, and making a lot of commotion and smoke with fireworks.

In general, what I picked up from the Fallas themselves was biting political commentary with lots of not-so-subtle likening’s of unpopular politicians and news media outlets to the devil. Boy, the Spanish certainly love to stick it to the man while having a little fun.

Besides spending lots of our time walking around and taking pictures of the Fallas, we also visited the beach. My friend and I wanted to get in the water before the sunset. Although in the end we decided it was too cold to swim, we still got our feet wet and enjoyed the soft sand.

Then, we spent the rest of the night relaxing, eating, and watching the festivities. By the time the fireworks display had started, we didn’t have much to say. We were cast into a state of silence because of our exhaustion and the wonderful pyrotechnics.

As we got back on the bus, I took another look at Valencia. The city that I had felt so much in love with this morning was covered in a thick blanket of smoke. This unnatural “fog” gave the place a touch of mystery and unsettling enchantment. It felt like a foreshadowing of the momentous burning to come on the 19th. Then a final thought: only humans could create a celebration with such beautiful pieces of art just to reduce them to ash in the end.