The Place: Benicàssim on the east coast of Spain is home to Festival Internacional de Benicàssim, without a doubt the best festival I've been to so far.
Some features: The festival brings a lot of British revellers and mainly English bands so was definitely not a 'cultural' Spanish experience but the bands, venue, party vibe, beaches and aquapark were absolutely awesome!
A typical day begins with waking up involuntarly in the searing heat of the tent early in the morning with little choice but to head straight to the beach. With the first bands only kicking off at about 6 there is no rush so after a light desayuno y cafe solo in town we would just head straight to the beach and veg there for the day. Later we'd pick up some drinks and groceries and head to the campsite where we'd sit around (about 10 of us) joking, eating, drinking, jamming with musical egg and make shift water bottle drum till about 9 to head down to the stages. With the headliner on at 1am and the music continuing 'till the early hours of the morning we were set for a big night out, followed by little sleep and an early sun wake up call to start it up all over again.
Really enjoyed the music of Mumford & Sons and Vampire Weekend, the stage performance of Goldfrapp, and the mixes of The Scratch Perverts, but by far the most intense was The Prodigy which had everyone jumping & moshing for an hour and a half non-stop belting out all of their hits one after the other.
Another great feature was the nearby waterpark (Aquarama) which is a typical super tube, racing slides and wave pool type waterpark but after feeling dirty, hot and tired from the night before with sleeping late in the tent not being an option, it was great to lie in the shade on some grass, go for a dip whenever, be close to food and water and act like a kid again on the slides.
Best of all, the 10 of us, most not knowing more than 2 of the others, all got along famously and had an wikid time.
