Tag: "new years eve"

New Year’s Eve In Prague

kelvinlls | January 30, 2011 | Comments (2)

Happy New Year Everyone! I just came back from a brief European adventure and I thought I’d share my exciting experience there to you all. My first post of the year, so I hope you will all enjoy it!

Greeting The New Year In The Romantic City of Prague

Prague - a city known for its beautiful architecture, romantic views and cheap beer. It’s no wonder that since the Czech Republic abandoned Communism and embraced the free world, throngs of tourists have discovered the beauty and elegance of this stunning city. Apart from its great sights, with such cheap and great beer, many young Europeans (British guys in particular) have descended for buck’s nights/stag parties, drinking spree weekends and a whole lot of clubbing. It’s become party central and THE place to be in Central Europe for those wanting great night clubs and parties.

For New Year’s Eve, Prague was known to have one of the best spots to watch fireworks behind the beautiful Prague Castle and the majestic Charles Bridge. I saw all the Youtube videos of New Year’s Eve fireworks in Prague from the previous years, and I said to myself, I have to be there for it. And of course, being party central, so many night clubs are sure to be offering great party options in the city.

After having witnessed 3 great New Year’s Eve fireworks in Sydney, I was inspired to check out the New Year’s Eve fireworks of the other countries and take great shots of it. A group of my friends and I started discussing the places we can go to celebrate the New Year, and what initially started out as a trip to Paris became Prague when we saw those great videos.

Fireworks Prague Style

Prague Old Town New Years Eve 2011

Prague (or “Praha” as the locals call it) is known for great fireworks display over the past few years, but what we have neglected to check is that the city also allows its citizens to light their own firecrackers and do their own fireworks display! There doesn’t seem to be any rules around lighting firecrackers across the city, and so they go crazy lighting up wherever they please. This obviously is quite dangerous, and some people do get hurt if they happen to stand in front of those lighting the firecrackers!

My friends and I were shock to find out about this, but since we already booked our ticket to go to Prague for the New Year, there is no backing out anymore. Besides, having grown up in the Philippines where they sell dynamite-strength firecrackers and cause hundreds of injuries each year, we thought we can easily survive this one.

We positioned ourselves on the Old Town side of the River Vltava, hoping to having a view of both the Charles Bridge and the Prague Castle. On our way there, we had to fight through the crowds and saw a few police patrol cars going around and approaching locals who have been misbehaving and throwing fireworks at other people. The whole atmosphere in Prague was kind of chaotic, but it wasn’t bad enough to stop us from having a great time and catching a glimpse of what is said to be one of the best New Year’s Eve fireworks display around.

When my friends and I finally found a spot to setup our tripods and take great photos of the Prague Castle and Charles Bridge, we were all hoping to see the fireworks come out from behind the castle. The countdown began, and when the clock struck midnight, there was hardly any fireworks to be seen!! Well, as we turned around, we saw much of the fireworks on our side of the Vltava River and not behind the castle! We had to shift our cameras, but with the jam-packed space by the river, we could hardly move our cameras! I took as much shots as I possibly could. Some were good, some weren’t. At the end of the day, we thought that the Sydney New Year’s Eve fireworks were still more spectacular than the one in Prague. Nevertheless, going to Prague for the fireworks was a good reason to visit this romantic city.

The following day, we found out from one of the locals that the government apparently ran out of money to do the fireworks display, and hence, all we saw were the ones that the locals fired off themselves!! Well, here are some of the better shots we got:

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Prague Fireworks NYE 2011 - With Charles Bridge and Prague Castle

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Prague Fireworks NYE 2011 - on the other side of the bridge

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More Prague Fireworks NYE 2011

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Prague - Unsynchronised Fireworks Lit by Locals - NYE 2011

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Some more small fireworks in Prague NYE 2011

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Last few big fireworks display in Prague NYE 2011

New Year’s Eve In Madrid

kelvinlls | December 15, 2009 | Comments (0)

New Year’s Eve Party In The Spanish Capital

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Puerta Del Sol, Madrid

Madrid, Spain – It’s one of Europe’s great cities. With great food, vibrant culture, fabulous architecture and friendly people, Madrid has a lot of appeal to people who visit the Spanish capital. However, I personally think it’s an underrated European city in relation to its peers. Often, visitors to Spain would either go to Barcelona or head down south to Andalucia and the Mediterrannean coast for some sun, and bypass Madrid altogether. I think people are missing out, but I’ll be happy to keep this secret to myself (oops! spilled the beans now! LOL!) Madrid still gets its fair share of tourists visiting from all over the world, but the numbers are nowhere near those visiting Paris or Rome or even Barcelona.

The New Year’s Eve celebration is a big thing in Madrid. It hosts Spain’s biggest New Year’s Eve festivities and is televised nationwide to the rest of Spain. The party centres on Puerta del Sol, in the heart of Madrid. Several stages are setup in the area, offering a wide range of music from techno dance music to hiphop, to Tango and Flamenco style music. People flock to the streets and the verandahs on the buildings surrounding Puerta del Sol have tons of party goers looking down on the street to check out the festivities.

New Year’s Eve Luck

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Clock Countdown at Puerta Del Sol, Madrid

I was fortunate enough to have experienced this New Year’s Eve festivities a couple of years ago. I flew in from London to Madrid on the 31st of December just to be able to celebrate the New Year in this fabulous Spanish capital. It was my first time to travel on New Year’s Eve, and I hadn’t realised how busy the airports in London can get on that day! The queues were ridiculously long, and we almost missed our flight!

Our flight was in fact overbooked, and the lady at the check in counter shouted to everyone that the last direct flight to Madrid only has 3 seats left and the rest of the passengers would have to take the flight to Geneva and connect to Madrid from there. I was travelling with my sister and my brother in law, and my brother in law went for it and luckily we got the 3 seats just in time! The downside was, because we checked in too late, they forgot to load our luggages into the plane and we landed in Madrid with no luggage at all!

We reported the case of our missing luggage to the airline, and they told us it would be a couple of days before we get our luggage! I needed some clothes to wear for the next few days, and my sis, brother-in-law and I didn’t have a clue where to shop in Madrid. So, we ended up at the department store called El Corte Ingles, which we then realised is one of the most expensive places to shop in Spain! Nevertheless, we enjoyed shopping for our new outfits in time for the New Year’s Eve party at Puerta del Sol!

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Venezuelan Party goers, New Year's Eve, Puerta Del Sol

One interesting tradition they have in Spain is that at the stroke of 12 midnight, everyone on the streets start to eat 12 grapes to symbolise good luck and great fortune for the upcoming year. This is one tradition that has actually been adopted into the Philippine culture, as it was something I grew up with, and I never knew it was originally a Spanish tradition!

In Puerta del Sol, people were just handing out grapes and sharing with people on the streets. It was such a great atmosphere where everyone is just so happy and having a great time with the party. When the clock struck midnight, some fireworks display happened in Puerta del Sol, and confetti poured in.. I met a few Venezuelans and locals alike on the streets, and everyone had a fantastic time! This is one place I’d recommend to go for a New Year’s Eve Party!

More of Madrid on the next post. Have a Fabulous Journey ahead!