On our second night in Valencia we travelled one hour to Requena for their annual water and wine festival, which is the oldest wine harvest festival in Spain. The night we went was their “Noche de la Zurra” (night of music) and it’s a night where the local folk parade through the town following the small orchestras and carrying wineskins. People basically take to the streets to beseech the powers-that-be for the water needed for the next harvest.
There were 500 of us on our tour that went and we were practically the only foreigners in the town. We had been told to take our own alcohol with us and that we just needed to go with
the flow as every year it’s different so they never know what to expect but that it was always awesome. It was a lovely small town and we spent a couple of hours just wandering around and having fun with the others from our hostel. We were lucky enough to have an Australian guy with us that could speak Spanish so he asked some locals if they knew what was going to happen that night as the streets seemed fairly quiet, we were told that this year the festival was centered in the bull ring – somewhere we couldn’t get without a ticket! Boo! We were a bit disappointed as it didn’t seem like anything was going to happen but then luckily at midnight the crowds started pouring out of the arena and the bands started assembling themselves and before you know it we’re all dancing down the streets with the crowds.
As the procession make its way through the streets, the tenants hurl buckets of water or use a hose out the
ir windows and the people go wild chanting “agua, agua” (water, water) until they get soaked and then they walk/dance a little further up the street and do it again. About an hour into it we came across the first tanker of wine (from the first pressing) which is free and you just pass up your drink bottle and they fill it up for you. It tasted pretty awful as it was so new, but a lot was drunken and also thrown over each other. It was such a joyous, crazy atmosphere and we had a great time. It was certainly a night to remember and we rate it as one of the best cultural experiences we had on our OE. It's also worth mentioning that we didn't take our camera to this event or La Tomatina so any pics are of pals from the tour...(Thanks Jazz!)
There were 500 of us on our tour that went and we were practically the only foreigners in the town. We had been told to take our own alcohol with us and that we just needed to go with
the flow as every year it’s different so they never know what to expect but that it was always awesome. It was a lovely small town and we spent a couple of hours just wandering around and having fun with the others from our hostel. We were lucky enough to have an Australian guy with us that could speak Spanish so he asked some locals if they knew what was going to happen that night as the streets seemed fairly quiet, we were told that this year the festival was centered in the bull ring – somewhere we couldn’t get without a ticket! Boo! We were a bit disappointed as it didn’t seem like anything was going to happen but then luckily at midnight the crowds started pouring out of the arena and the bands started assembling themselves and before you know it we’re all dancing down the streets with the crowds.As the procession make its way through the streets, the tenants hurl buckets of water or use a hose out the
ir windows and the people go wild chanting “agua, agua” (water, water) until they get soaked and then they walk/dance a little further up the street and do it again. About an hour into it we came across the first tanker of wine (from the first pressing) which is free and you just pass up your drink bottle and they fill it up for you. It tasted pretty awful as it was so new, but a lot was drunken and also thrown over each other. It was such a joyous, crazy atmosphere and we had a great time. It was certainly a night to remember and we rate it as one of the best cultural experiences we had on our OE. It's also worth mentioning that we didn't take our camera to this event or La Tomatina so any pics are of pals from the tour...(Thanks Jazz!)Our coaches left the town at 3:30am but I tell you we could’ve all kept on going we were on such a buzz. We got back to the hostel at 4:30am and were up again at 7:30am to get on the road for the reason we’d all come to Valencia…La Tomatina!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment