Most visitors think Ibiza shuts down in November. The big clubs chain up their doors and the coastal resorts empty out fast. But 150,000 people live here year-round and they need things to do. The local civic calendar runs straight through winter into spring. Going to these town festivals gives you a completely different view of the island because you get to see the actual communities that keep the water running and the lights on after the tourists leave.
January: The Three Kings Parade
The Three Kings arrive by boat in Eivissa harbor right around sunset on January 5. It is a major holiday. You will see local families wrapped in heavy winter coats pressing against the metal barricades. The kings get off their ship and lead a parade up the steep streets of Dalt Vila while attendants throw hard boiled sweets into the crowd. Watch your head because those candies actually hurt if they hit you square in the nose. I caught one right on the collarbone last year and had a bruise for a week. Everyone eats a ring-shaped cake called a roscón de reyes the next morning. You can grab one at the local bakeries for about 18 euros. Half the time the pastry is dry.
March and April: Easter Week
Good Friday up in the old town is dead silent. Hooded members of the local brotherhoods carry heavy wooden floats depicting the Passion through the Portal de les Taules gate. The only sound is a slow drumbeat and feet scraping on stone. Wax from hundreds of candles drips heavily onto the cobblestones and hardens into thick black patches. Which makes walking back down to the harbor in flat shoes incredibly slippery later that night. Do not wear fresh white sneakers. The wax takes weeks to scrape off the streets.
May: The Flower Battle
Santa Eulària des Riu shuts down the main pedestrian strip on Passeig de s’Alamera for its flower festival on the second Sunday of May. Locals dress up in heavy ball pagès gear for a parade. Then the battle starts. People just pelt each other with yellow and red petals for a solid hour. It gets loud. You will find crushed flower fragments stuck to the soles of your shoes for days afterward even if you try to wash them off in the hotel shower.
June: Bonfires in the North
June 23 is the night of the bonfires. Up in the rural north the village of Sant Joan de Labritja throws a massive party for the summer solstice. They stack giant wood piles right in the main square. Once it gets dark the fires are lit and the smoke smells strongly of pine resin. You can buy cheap cuts of pork and thick slices of spicy sobrassada sausage from folding tables to grill yourself over the hot embers. Getting there is tricky. The main two-lane road into the village clogs up completely by 8 PM. A massive headache if you didn’t rent a scooter.
August: The Hot Month
Two massive local holidays get crammed into a three-day window in the first week of August. It is chaotic. August 5 is the feast of the island’s patron saint. Thousands of people hike up the hill to the white church at Puig de Missa to share picnics of heavy meat stews in 35-degree heat while stray dogs try to steal the leftovers. Then August 8 marks Reconquista Day. The island politicians gather in the main cathedral square in Dalt Vila to give speeches commemorating the 1235 Catalan conquest and they all look entirely miserable sweating in their formal wool suits under the afternoon sun.
December: New Wine in Sant Mateu
The rural valley of Sant Mateu d’Albarca is the center of the local wine industry. Their wine festival happens in mid-December. The wine here is rough and highly alcoholic. You stand around in the damp cold drinking young red Monastrell out of small plastic cups next to a muddy parking lot. Farmers bring out trays of local cheese and ensaïmada pastries to soak up the alcohol. It costs almost nothing to participate. You just show up and grab a cup from a folding table and hope it doesn’t rain.
Fotografie: jotter2, via Flickr