Midsummer magic: Les Fogueres, the Costa Blanca's Fallas-style festival

THE LONGEST day north of the tropics has now passed, and summer is officially here, exams are over, schools and colleges in Spain have broken up for the next three months, and fiesta season is ready to kick off.

In some parts of the country, it already has, given that the summer solstice is when many towns opt to celebrate their main annual pageants – and, in most of them, there's a lot of burning going on.

It's only actually a handful of locations in the Pyrénées which mark the solstice on the right date. Heading to the mountains on the border between France and Spain, you'll find torchlit parades coming down from the hills in the Basque Country, the northernmost province in Aragón, that of Huesca, and the two frontier counties in Catalunya, Girona and Lleida.

Folk songs are sung and folk dances are danced, bonfires are lit – tradition dictates the most recent person in a given village, or couple if they both come from there, to have got married, sets the huge wood pile aflame – and ashes left over at the end of the night are shared out between everyone there and kept in a jar at home for good luck.

On that night, June 21, the sun will have set at around 21.15 or 21.20 in these parts and on the Mediterranean seaboard, having risen at approximately 06.30 or 06.35 that morning; Spain's easternmost point, the Balearic island of Menorca, sees day break about 20 minutes earlier and the sun go down about five or 10 minutes before.

So Spain still gets around nine hours of darkness – slightly more, and all happening an hour earlier in the Canary Islands according to the clock, albeit at the same moment in time – over the longest day, compared with about 14 hours of darkness on the shortest day on December 21; quite a difference from northern Scandinavia where midsummer is an equally huge celebration and where the night barely lasts three hours (in the Icelandic capital of Reykjavík, for example, two hours and 49 minutes, with sunset at two minutes past midnight).

The other summer solstice festivals in Spain come two or three days later – on the eve of Saint John's Day (Día de San Juan), which is June 24, or the end of that day, depending upon where you are.

Beach fires and 'southern Fallas'

If you're on the coast, San Juan's eve night, or June 23, might involve groups of friends or family members lighting small bonfires on the beach, then tradition dictates that each person writes a 'wish list' of what they hope will come true between then and the next San Juan night, throwing said list into the flames on the stroke of midnight, and immediately leaping over them before running into the sea and jumping over the first three waves that break.

Other coastal towns have banned beach bonfires for reasons that range from having to clear up the mess the next day through to concerns about nesting aquatic birds being disturbed or dune plants going up in smoke.

If you're in the province of Alicante, particularly somewhere along its coastline, the Costa Blanca, the bonfires are a little more elaborate than just a few twigs and pallets.

'Bonfire' in Spanish is Hoguera, or in the regional language of the Comunidad Valenciana – of which Alicante is the southernmost of its three provinces – valenciano, it is Foguera, or in the plural, Fogueres; a week-long fiesta of the same name, depending upon which of these languages the town in question tends to use most, ends in a tower of flames on every street corner on the night of San Juan.

You could, in fact, be forgiven for thinking it was a quarter-year Fallas, since the similarities between the Hogueras de San Juan, or Fogueres de Sant Joan, and the massive March fiestas in the province of Valencia are huge. Indeed, the only real differences are, firstly, the date, and secondly, that the Fallas – along with the Pyrénéen summer solstice festivals – are UNESCO Intangible Heritage, whereas the Hogueras are not.

Fogueres, or Hogueras, developed off the back of the Fallas

It's not clear why the Fallas are limited to the province of Valencia and a handful of towns in the south of that of Castellón and north of that of Alicante (only Dénia, Pego and Ondara's tied hamlet of Pamís in the latter), but if you ever plan to see this world-famous festival and manage to miss it, you effectively get a second chance three months later between 30 and 200 kilometres down the coast.

As well as Alicante city, the Fogueres are celebrated in its near neighbours, San Vicente del Raspeig and San Juan de Alicante (officially, and in valenciano, Sant Joan d'Alacant), to the north of the province in Jávea, Calpe and Benidorm, and south of the capital, close to the Murcia border, in Torrevieja, Elche and Guardamar del Segura.

The fiesta has also been on tour, celebrated in Gothenburg, Sweden, in Lisbon, Portugal and in Lyon, France, in different years, as part of a drive to promote Alicante as a holiday destination.

It was Alicante-born painter and sculptor José María Py who, in 1928, came up with the idea of a 'southern Fallas' to attract tourism in the same way as the province of Valencia had managed to do with its spring equinox festival.

As for why it ended up being over the summer solstice instead, this was because, in 1881, the usual annual municipal bann warning residents they would be fined heavily if they lit bonfires in the street to celebrate the longest night was, thanks to a mix-up, not issued; given that the prohibition was legally considered null and void without the bann being published, city dwellers decided to take advantage of the loophole and went outside to party, let off fireworks and set wood-piles aflame.

José María Py, back in 1928, said: “Alicante's bonfires are well-known as a tradition since time immemorial; we should give them the same character as the fallas in Valencia have been given.”

Similar monuments and festival queens, different names

Huge statues made from papier mâché, wood and cork, painted brightly, and featuring caricatures of politicians and celebrities, satirising current affairs, go up for the Fallas in Valencia in March; these monuments, known as fallas with a lower-case 'f', each have a marquée or casal attached where the commission or fiesta club based in that district spends the days and nights of the festival eating, drinking and partying around the clock, then on the last night, the house-sized statues are burned down in order of the prizegiving ceremony results, with the winner last. 

The Falla Queen, or fallera mayor, chooses one of the figurines or ninots to save from the flames, and this goes on display in a local museum; the fallera del foc sets light to the string of bangers wrapped around the monument to start the burning, and the fallera del casal provides all the refreshments for the week.

For the Hogueras de San Juan, or Fogueres de Sant Joan, the casals are known as barracas, or 'huts'; the monuments are called hogueras or fogueres, and the figure known as the Fallera Mayor in Valencia in March is called the Belleza del Fuego or, in valenciano, the Bellea del Foc, in June in Alicante.

Once again, the Bellea del Foc gets to save a ninot from burning, but unlike the fallera mayor, this prestigious status is not limited to once in a lifetime.

Given that, like the Fallas, every district has a 'main' monument and a smaller one for the children, with a 'queen' of each, and the same pattern is followed at the Fogueres, the Bellea del Foc has to be a minimum of 19 years old – a Bellea Infantil, or children's foguera queen, can be any age up to and including 18.

Until 2008, the age limit for a Bellea del Foc was 26, but that year, it was lifted, meaning any adult female who wants to stand for voting can do so.

Explosive bits

Both Fallas and Fogueres involve flames and fireworks – for the latter, this is in line with the ancient pagan custom, worldwide, of creating light and heat to give the sun back the energy it starts 'losing' after the longest day; for the former, fire is symbolic of cleansing and renewal to mark the end of winter and start of spring.

To this end, huge and colourful displays of rockets are let off during the 'northern' and the 'southern' versions of the Fallas, typically on the last day.

In Alicante city, the fireworks come daily after the fiesta is over – from June 25 to 29 inclusive, on the stroke of midnight, they are let off on El Cocó beach for a minimum of 18 minutes, set to shoot up in the direction of the sea.

At the Fogueres, like at the Fallas, another key explosive feature is the mascletà, where strings of gunpowder fire-crackers well above head-height are let off, in a chain reaction, producing clouds of smoke – sometimes in colour – and deafening noise.

The aim is not just to break the sound barrier, though. The mascletà has a certain rhythm to it, almost musical, and is designed to 'stimulate the body into action' (even if that action involves swiftly pulling out a set of ear-plugs), beginning slowly and then rising to a crescendo that literally makes the ground tremble. 

Although, during Fallas, the mascletà in Valencia city and other towns throughout the province goes off at 14.00 each of the four days of the festival, during the Fogueres, in addition to those which take place over the fiesta period of June 18 to 24 inclusive, they are also set to go on each weekend of June leading up to it. This year, mascletaes rocked the earth on June 4 and 5 and again on June 11 and 12, before the festival began in earnest a week ago.

One very final aspect of the Fallas, and also the Fogueres, and which visitors to the region always consider a travesty, is the destruction of the colourful monuments by fire on the last night – June 24 during the latter, March 19 for the former.

But it is not merely another nod to the 'flaming' tradition associated with the spring equinox and summer solstice; the cremà, or burning, has a practical purpose: Where on earth would you store statues the height of a block of flats made from highly-combustible material? And especially given that the festivals take place annually. Bringing the same ones out every year would mean no prizegiving, since the judges' evaluation would not change for the same monuments from one year to the next. Also, they are supposed to be a critique, or satire, of what is happening locally or in the world at the time, with the ninots representing real people or known fictional characters. Using the same fogueres or fallas again and again means they would cease to be topical.

Equally, the professional artists who create them, spending up to 10 months a year on their handiwork, would be out of a job otherwise – having to build new ones annually keeps them in employment.

A key difference between the cremà at the Fallas and the one signifying the end of the Fogueres is dictated largely by the weather. The latter includes the traditional banyà, or 'drenching': Whilst the monuments burn, the heat close enough to the flames to get a good view can be somewhat uncomfortable in the third week in June, whereas in March, spectators often try to get as near to the blaze as possible to warm their hands. Firefighters are always on site, dousing nearby buildings, keeping the inferno safely contained, as well as ensuring it is completely extinguished afterwards; during the Fogueres, they also soak spectators with their hoses to cool them down, which is highly refreshing and welcome – but which would not go down too well at a time of year when those watching the combustion tend to be well-wrapped in coats, gloves and scarves.

Indeed, visitors to the Comunidad Valenciana who 'feel the cold' and lament the fact that the Fallas take place when it's still a bit chilly will find the answer to their prayers at the Fogueres – practically the same fiesta, just in warmer temperatures.

Parades, costumes and flowers

Parades tour the streets throughout both the Valencia and the Alicante fiestas – during the Fallas, floats and fancy-dress processions followed by a prizegiving are part of the schedule, whilst during the Hogueras de San Juan, a folklore display, with participants in costume from various countries worldwide perform traditional national dance and music in an enormous cosmopolitan carnival, complete with floats.

This is one of the most popular features of the Hogueras in Alicante city, taking place on the night of June 23 between the Plaza de los Luceros and the city hall square via the Avenida de Alfonso el Sabio, the Rambla and the C/ Altamira, always drawing in massive crowds of international spectators. 

Both fiestas include a symbolic offering of flowers to the Virgin Mary, where bystanders will see a gigantic wooden frame with the head of Christ's mother on top gradually filling up with colourful blooms until her body and dress appear, entirely made from bouquets.

In the province of Valencia during Fallas, the 'Mary' figure is the Virgen de los Desamparados, or 'Virgin of the Homeless', whilst in Alicante during Fogueres, she is the Virgen del Remedio, the 'Virgin of the Remedy' or the 'Cure'.

Costumes worn throughout the fiestas by commission members, the festival queens and her entourage are much the same – traditional regional gala get-up, made from damask or dense silk, embroidered and lace-trimmed, in bright colours, with a wide skirt supported by a crinoline, capped sleeves and a tight bodice, and gold and silver adornments in the hair, which is either plaited and rolled into 'coffee coasters' at the back and sides, or tucked in with hairpieces in the same design pinned to it.