Burn, baby, burn – Las Fallas with Stoke Travel

Monday, 19 March, close to midnight, Valencia

A PYROMANIAC STANDS in the street. There’s a party going on, but he doesn’t notice. He is focused on an immense statue fabricated with timber. Smoke starts to fill the Valencian night sky. A bulge forms rapidly in his pants.

Las Fallas is about burning stuff. Burning extravagant, beautifully crafted, timber statues to be precise (and all types of firecracker wicks). It’s the biggest fiesta on the Valenciano calendar, a festival that takes the best aspect of rioting (burning shit) and combines it with the best aspect of being black-out-drunk (kissing strangers). Las Fallas is a street party the likes of which you’ve never seen, an extravaganza of building and burning, of love, life and lust, of sangria and the sanguinity associated with the end of winter.

They say Las Fallas is a celebration of carpentry and of the decline of winter. We add to that and say that it’s one helluva grand old time. The Valencianos close the city to all vehicles that aren’t associated with the extinguishing of infernos, so the streets are claimed by the drinkers, the dancers and the maker-outerers. We party the night away with the locals, we drink until we’re sure we can tango, we lock lips with señors and señoritas and we have a whale of a time.

Stoke Travel hearts Las Fallas. Like all of our festival setups we pride ourselves on having the best pre and post festival parties, on you getting more bang for your buck, on creating a truly international environment and on making our number one priority having FUN. We’ve been coming here for a while now, so we know what’s going on. And we have an open bar, so you can drink all the beer, wine and sangria you can stomach (or liver) for only 5€ a day.

Stoke Travel runs its Las Fallas camp from 15 – 20 March. The big nights are the Saturday night, duh, and the Monday night, which is when they actually burn the statues. Trips start at 25€ a night. For more information visit StokeTravel.com