New Year's Eve
Says goodbye the old year
When: December 31 at 00:00h
Interesting because: says goodbye to the old year and welcome the new year is given, it is customary to eat 12
grapes at 00: 00h, wearing a red garment and toast with Cava.
Where: throughout Spain. In Barcelona don't miss the show in front Montjuïc Fountains.
Barcelona lives very intensively the New Year’s Eve, the night of December 31st. It is a tradition to eat 12 grapes at
the midnight but, opposite to how it is celebrated in other cities, this ritual takes place in the privacy of the relatives
or friends’ home. Therefore, before and during the dinner, the city remains lonely and quiet until it is 12am.
Here is customary to take the twelve grapes at midnight, but in contrast to what happens in other
cities, this ritual is met in private and not outdoors. Before dinner do not expect to find many people on
the street, who did not just dinner out in restaurants after midnight of the night before that time not
many neither public nor private parties.
However, those tourists whose house is far away can meet in Plaça Catalunya or in Plaça Sant Jaume in order to
welcome together the New Year. The squares are crowded with more than 50.000 people similarly to what happens
in another spots of the city such as La Torre Agbar (The Agbar Tower) and El Poble Espanyol. La Torre Agbar became
a meeting point because on the night of December 31st it lights up as the clock strikes twelve.
After midnight, the city breaks out into huge parties and music from pubs, night clubs and either from the beach and
the small mountain of Montjuïc, where El Poble Espanyol offers party up to early in the morning. Moreover, some
theatres like Tívoli or Victòria offer music shows and cotillion as an innovative way of celebrating such an special
night.
It is worth it to end up the night at any of the Barcelona’s beaches observing the sunrise and to start the first day of
the New Year having xurros amb xocolata (“Churros” with hot chocolate) for breakfast.
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