Las Fallas

A five day celebration and dub as most important festival in Valencia, Las Fallas begins on a friday night and culminates on a big fire on wednesday night.

Fallas, mascletas are two important factors of the celebration. I only had a chance to stay for the weekend but it's one of the most significant festivals in spain that i had experienced so far (not that i could claim i'd seen much).

Fallas - it normally takes a year to prepare the fallas. Only in the end have them burned! 

Mascleta - loosely translated to fireworks.

Every 2 oclock in the afternoon, before the final night of burning, mascletas are held in several spots in the city.  Some fallas are burnt down through use of fireworks. 

On my first day of the festival, i decided to join a group of couchsurfers and locals for the mascleta. Eventhough there's a discussion that there'd be loads of people we did not anticipate that even arriving an hour early would mean getting stuck up still several blocks from the mascleta at plaza ayuntamiento. I did not even see even one firework on that broad daylight! But they say its all about noise anyway!  I was lucky i was beside a local explaining a bit on what to expect, and a guy from barcelona who did not mind translating them for me. 

Lights of ruzafa!

In the evening I was able to catch up with the CS group at Lights of Ruzafa.  It was a stunning display of lights with music.

Fireworks at 1 am!

Valencia's really on fire during Las Fallas, and the whole city waited for the fireworks at 1 am Sunday.  

--- On the following day though before i head back to Madrid i went to the mascleta spot near ayuntamiento much earlier, i was still not in the prime location (hundreds of people were there ahead of me already) but i got a better viewing spot!