A greasy pole, ham slapping and 165 tonnes of tomatoes – It’s La Tomatina Time!
Hello Valencia, La Tomatina and catching up with Steph and Tyrone (Girles Gone Wild).
Unfortunately our London-living friends brought the weather with them š and southern Spain greeted us with cool weather and rain!
We booked La Tomatina through Busabout tours, which provided us with accommodation, transfers, entry, after party tix and singlets for our festival fun and it was all well organised.
Seeing as we hadn’t seen the Girle’s for a year, we wasted no time finding some paella and drinks as we caught up on all our travel stories.
Day 2 and it was festival time! We were up early for a bus to Bunol, a small town outside of Valencia which hosts the annual festival.
We arrived with plenty of time to have a look around and immerse ourselves in the party atmosphere with an early morning Sangria!
We left the camera behind (which was a good call) but I’ve put a couple of YouTube clips in so you can see what we experienced.
We found a good spot close to the greasy pole to watch locals and tourists attempt to scramble to the top to reach the jamon serrano (ham placed at the top of the pole) – a much sought afterĀ prize, but rarely accomplished.
11am and BOOM goes the first cannon, which signals the end of the greasy pole scramble, and the start of the La Tomatina festival.
Dump trucks rolled through the narrow streets (squishing the 22,000 attendees aside) with volunteers on top starting the tomato throwing fun. The trucks dump more than 165 tonnes of overripe, fat juicy tomatoes and its every man and woman for themselves.
Tom and I were in the thick of the action, throwing ourselves into the first pile of dumped tomatoes to squish and throw at the thousands around us.
BOOM! An hour later the second canon is fired to signal the end of the tomato fight. We were inches deep in tomato juice and covered from head to toe.
As we made our way back out of the main square, we took advantage of the many locals who had their hoses out to help festival goers clean up.
With the tomato chunks washed off we enjoyed a paella and sangria before bussing it back to Valencia for a much needed shower.
La Tomatina was really something else! The world’s biggest food fight festival is not for the faint hearted if you have a problem with massive crowds, pushing and shoving and tomato projectiles in the face – but if you’re prepared for what awaits, it will be one of the best days of your life!
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