Fallas (Continued)

Monday, March 17, 2014

The forecast for today is sunny and 80 degrees. Many of the out of town tourists have returned home and walking through the streets last night was a bit easier and that was the case this morning when we went to take a look at some of the nearby fallas.

Yesterday we passed up lunch at the casal to visit The Ginger Loft. This is their last week of operation and we knew that the only chance we would have to visit with them was yesterday. We got to experience, hopefully not for the last time, the best Eggs Benedict in existence, a green Thai curry and a ceviche to swoon for. We chatted with Mike after our meal and, at the moment, everything is up in the air.

We made our way to the casal last night at 7:30. The evening’s events were a tapa fair and a live performance by a rock and roll group. The concert was scheduled for midnight and that made two reasons to not stick around until late.

The tapa fair is a fundraiser and all drinks were 1 Euro and tapas were either one or two Euros depending on what you ordered. It seemed that all fish tapas were two and all others were one. The selections included tortilla española, salmón, ajo arriero, foie, jamón, bocadillos de morcilla, longaniza y chistorra, calamares, puntillas y pescadito. There was a good crowd on hand and it looks like they made enough money to amortize some of the costs of what is a year-round task.

Today the ofrenda begins. Because there are some 44 casals, it is a two-day event. The ofrenda is an offering of flowers for La Virgen de los Desamparados. There is a large wooden structure where the flowers are placed and atop the structure is a statue of the Virgin. The structure when filled with flowers becomes her dress. It is estimated some 60,000 flowers will be part of the offering. Our street is part of the route to La Plaza de la Virgen and that means that most of the casals and their bands will be passing by our building.