Festival of San Juan 2016

This is the 3rd time that we have been to the Festival of San Juan in Palma, Mallorca. It is held mid June around Summer Solstice and really is more of a pagan celebration than a Christian celebration of St John. It is a racuous night of devils, fireworks and debauchery. The theme is to dance with the devil in the midst of the fires and then to go and wash your sins away in the ocean at midnight. It is absolutely crazy and not for the faint of heart.

The pictures can't even begin to catch the outrageousness of it all, and the video footage we got can't be downloaded on the blog. There are a couple of good Youtube videos that are fun to watch:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=20n-L8jDAC4

www.dailymotion.com/video/x4if82f


The devils are emerging from the tunnel in the midst of the fire to begin chasing people in the crowds with fire torches and fireworks:

The fireworks are everywhere, all around you and above raining down on your head. It's wise to wear a hat or scarf to keep your hair from catching on fire:

Thousands of people gathered here for the festival:

Just one of the devils with his torch that you can dance with or run from:

A devil with his fire-spewing dragon as it gets ready to chase through the crowd:

Fire-spewing dragon with a very HOT breath:

Red hot breath and fire from his wings:

Another dragon to scare me again:

As the night comes to a close we are standing by the fire, exhausted but laughing. And once again, we decided to keep our sins and not wash them off in the ocean. Actually if we tried to dip in the ocean we would probably drown as we are so spent from too much fun:

In the blog entry dated June 2013, we have another good description of the Festival with more pictures. Every year that we can make it here for the Festival we enjoy it even more. And this year did not disappoint!!!