After the dynamic vibe of València, we headed south to the small coastal town of Dénia, just an hour and a half away. Dénia has about 42,000 inhabitants and is known for its beautiful beaches, historic sites and seafood restaurants. It's also the Spanish port where boats leave to Ibiza, Majorca and Menorca. That's probably a good thing because party-mad people and crowds of tourists tend to head out to the islands without stopping here more than a few hours. This means Dénia gets to keep its Spanish identity and chilled vibe.
I was super excited because:
I was looking forward to be away from the big cities and have more of a holiday vibe.
After obsessively watching over 200 episodes of ‘A place in the Sun’ since the first lockdown as a mood lifter before going to Spain, I felt I already knew Dénia: anyone stuck in the miserable UK weather and fan of daydreaming knows Dénia is one of the top towns featured in the show.
Dénia delivered. Arriving is like taking a deep breath in and letting out a long sigh. It definitely has a relaxed atmosphere and gives out a mix of tranquility and excitement. Well that was my feeling at least. Cuong was just ending another all-nighter machine-learning marathon glued to his laptop and looked as fresh as one of Unhygienix’s fish.
... Or Stimpy?
His eyes were bloodshot and he had a stomach ache. Thankfully, a couple of nights rest and banana and turmeric smoothies helped him regain his sparkly looks and health.
Fallas, fires and bangers
What we hadn’t realised is that the Fallas, this huge party over several weeks with lots of loud bangers and massive statue burnings and stuff that I described in the Valencia post, was also in full swing in Dénia… No escape.
When it comes to firecrackers, I have two modes: either jump out of my skin, or duck as if I was about to be hit by a burst of machine gun fire. Paranoia makes my eyes bulge and dart all over the place so I end up looking like Scrat, which as it happens, we spotted on one of the Fallas statues.
Of course the jumpier you look, the more little hooligans br@ts pick up on the vibe and target you for cracking bangers. And let me tell you, seems that Spain has NO regulation when it comes to the maximum level of powder you’re allowed to explode with these bangers, I don’t think I’ve ever heard such loud BANGS in my whole life, they would make an AK47 shooting sound like tiny farts.
My (not totally unjustified) cowardice was reluctantly overruled by pride, so Cuong managed to drag me (mopping) into town on the day of cremation of the Fallas statues. The soundproof plugs I stuffed in my ears didn't seem to work at all. Still, it was all worth it for the show, I may not like bangers but I do love fire and burning things, as my poor mother could testify after a few, ahem, house incidents in my youth (sorry again mum especially for burning a massive whole in the skin of the Dogon traditional drum brought all the way from Mali - I was trying to make it sound better by heating the skin above the gas stove but it didn't quite work out as planned…).
As you can see, the Fallas statues are a tad Disney-Kitsch in style with a welcome hint of satyre, but every time you look at them from a different angle, you spot a new detail and by the end of the week you start emoting about the leopard, the buffalo, the dancer, the fakir, and feel a bit sad about the day of their cremation. What a sight it was though: they plant fireworks within and around the statues (which bizarrely are much less loud than kids' bangers), then a jolly big band gets everyone hyped up, and for the whole night, crowds walk from one structure to another to watch them being burnt and this lasts from 8pm till 3am!
These are no small fire, a minimum of 5 firetrucks are there for each burning, and boy are they needed because the statues are scattered in all most important areas of the town, a few inches from electric cables, normal flats with bold people watching on balconies, the Mayor's office, Churches, the market, schools etc. To the sound of Bandas still playing tunes, the fire burns really high and loud, the crowds cheer and watch their favourite character burn to a crisp, turning some of them (especially leopards and panthers for some reason) into incandescent creatures from hell. Then the firemen hose the surrounding high buildings and the statues until the fire dies down, and finally, youth between 8 and 18 years old, each wearing half of their tradditional costume and half jeans and trainers, dance, and walk around the charred remains. How Pagan, how fun! We really enjoyed seeing the teens having such a blast. I'll start with the cremation vid of one of the structures (watch out for the eerie leopard emerging for, the flames!!! All of the statues pictured under were burnt, there were many more than here that we didn't capture.
The burning...
Us pagans enjoying the burning...
and the pics...
The Fallas confirmed Didi is 100% deaf as she wasn’t bothered by any of the bangers, busy as she was sniffing Chewie gonads on the beach.
So about these...
Chewie gonads
Didi loves paddling about on squishy spongy seaweed which is really good fun, apparently they are also full of interesting smells. But some weird ball dry thingies on the beach keep getting stuck in her pads' fur, and my fingers as a consequence. I had a really hard job cutting bits of them out with scissors, the damn things have tiny hooks which sting like nettles. After googling, I found they are commonly graphically referred to as "Chewie gonads", "Wookie Bollocks" in hommage to Star War's Chewbacca, or more poetically "Neptune balls".
Admittedly, they are the epitome of eco-cool. They're made from tangled debris of dead sea grass and "filter over 867 million pieces of plastic and rubbish from the water every year. They provide important ecosystem services and benefits, such as water quality improvement, CO2 absorption, climate change mitigation, sediment production for seafloor and beach stabilisation, coastal protection, nursery and refuge areas for many species and support in fisheries production." They can also be turned into an eco-insulation material. So yeah. I forgive them.
The water is really clear. The beach has Cote d'Azur type of rocky pools on one side of the town and sandy and wild on the other. There is an area just behind the sandy beach where noone is allowed to go because birds eggs are hatching, it was fun tracing their little feet every morning on our walks. Dogs are technically not allowed on beaches either but noone seems to care in the morning and people are generally good citizens about scooping.
We spotted quite a few campers including one obviously belonging to Mad Max which camper lovers will appreciate!
Gymming, swimming and saunaing
One of the highlights of our stay, aside having our breakfast on the sunny balcony of our Airbnb just 5 minutes from the beach, was going to the neighbouring huuuuge public sport complex with several pools, a spa, a gym, spa, sauna dance studios, outside baskeball, football and tennis courts. Not the kind of thing you can find in the UK, and if there was it would cost 4 times the price! We really enjoyed going there an hour every day to workout or just chill (the sea is still a bit too cool for us to swim in). Bravo Spain, it's fantastic to have this sort of facility within the means of "normal" people. As a results, there were often lots of tiny happy kids having a total blast splashing about (the tadpoles as we call them) but the place is so big it still feels relaxing. Good vibes.
Shouldn't have tried the highly-energetic Zumba class though, the sudden changes of direction did something super weird to both of my toes, some kind of blood blisters, which two weeks later still look like googly eyes!
Overall...
We loved Dénia and our homely Airbnb so much that we booked to come back 2 months in May and June. Here are some final pictures. For now, we're heading 6 hours South to Torremolinos to visit our old besties Samuel and Craig, who moved there from Cambridge a couple of years ago! Yippee!
See you soon in Torremolinos. XX
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