New Years and King's Day

 First, here're some better pictures of our decorations for you :)

On a hike, J found this cactus fruit which we ate:

Here is the beginnings of some yummy soup we had for dinner:

For New Year's Eve people gathered in the church square for fireworks, champagne and grape eating. When the clock starts to strike 12, you eat a grape for each strike, giving you good luck for every month for every grape you've successfully eaten! Then fireworks are thrown by the kids. There was also some "graffiti" written by the kids on the walls with some spray stuff that evaporates and leaves no trace behind. It was very interesting. The fireworks were WAY too loud for me. Every time I tried to get a picture, the camera was too slow, so that's why there aren't any pics of that.

I bet you thought no one lived here since no one is ever in our pictures of this town! Well, here are some of the locals :D

Here are some of the holiday decorations put up by the city:

Remember these balconies for the end of the post!

Later on, on Jan 5th, there is a parade where candy, treats and goodies are thrown to the crowd!  On the way to the parade:

We passed by my favorite pastry shop calle La Gloria. They always have amazing things and everything, regardless of size, is 1dollar! We definitely got some goodies.

My favorite so far!

Here start the parade pictures!

Most brought bags to put their candy into after they picked it up from the ground. These kids brought umbrellas to catch the candy!!

Goofin' around waiting for the parade, which now, is within earshot.

First set of candy throwers. Very nice lady closest to us with glasses on.

First band to pass by. The little one on the lower right is helping himself to some candy!

All floats were pulled by these :)

This lady got a toy sword thrown her way!

Every float was surrounded like this. Candy was thrown really hard to try to reach the people waaay off to the right and left of the streets. This caused me to duck or shield myself plenty of times because the candy hurt when thrown like that!

Handing out some stuff. For one second we didn't have to duck from hurtling candy!

Some soccer balls were thrown these kids' way.

Even adults and the elderly want some candy!

Second band, the high schoolers.

Candy being thrown.

Giant bags for candy holding!

To give you an idea of what it was like! Any time candy was thrown, it got worse! Haha

After the parade, we went home and ate some candy :) Before that though, we gave lots of our candy to the elderly who were out on their balconies(remember the picture earlier?) who were stuck there because of a wheelchair or crutches or casts. As you can see, the parade was no place for them to be. They were thrilled to be getting candy!