Valencia - parte 2! [Valencia - part 2!]

So, back to Valencia.   :)

After the beach we made the wise decision to head back home to our hostel and get ready for the night's festivities!  Sunday night was called the Nit del Foc, which isn't Spanish, by the way, but it translates from Romanian to Night of Fire, and they were lighting the sky with fireworks.  Valencia is considered the world's pyrotechnic capital...and I definitely agree with that statement after seeing the firework show Sunday night!

 
We watched the fireworks from under a bridge, and when we came up to street level to go back home on the metro, all we saw was a HUGE mob of people flooding the 5 lane wide street coming towards us.  At this point, the group of 8 of us decided to grab a travel buddy and make our way back home to the hostel in pairs...I swear, getting 8 people home safe in that mob was incredible!
We all ended up on the same metro train anyway, but it was similar to sardines in the metro, and on the streets..well, let's just say I have NEVER seen that many people in one area of a city before.  It was absolutely loco, but it was definitely a sight I will never forget!

Monday we didn't do much except bum around the city and in doing so, we found the large Virgen  in the middle of the city, which is adorned with tons of carnations.

Here's an up close shot of the detail on the statue!  It truly was beautiful!  And to the left, look at all of the people! It was like that all weekend long, but being here was definitely worth the crowds!

And of course, a trip to Valencia is not complete without a meal of Paella!  :)  With chicken of course! 

  

Valencia's Cathedral - because no Spanish city would be quite complete without one! 
















And also, there were 100's of thousands (I read it in the newspaper) of women dressed like this the entire weekend - my host mom told me they're called vestidos regionales, which means regional dresses.  She says every region has a different type of dress, and this happens to be that of Valencia!  They only wear them on festivals and special occasions, though!


Phew, and finally..I'm almost done, I promise!  Monday our bus left at 4pm, but the burning of las fallas happened at midnight that night.  I didn't stay to watch the burning because I wanted to get back in time for classes on Tuesday morning, but I had friends who did stay!  Here's a photo of one of the fallas being burnt!  It was really  neat how they did it...they set up a giant line of fireworks and firecrackers before the falla, and lit the end on fire..the flames worked it's way through the firecrackers until it hit the falla!  My friends told me it was really neat to see!

And with that, I conclude my trip to Valencia!  I know it was two really long posts, but I wanted to show you everything I saw!  :)  I hope you enjoyed it!  And keep reading, because I have a lot of travel plans coming up really soon!  Barcelona, the Canary Islans with mom and dad, Portugal, and even Italy!

Love you all,

besos y abrazos,
Erin