I left off from my last blog just as we were headed out the door for the event that I wrote about a week ago that we bought tickets for.  We were off to a soccer game at the Mestalla Stadium where the Valencia FC team were playing the Alaves, two Spanish teams in the same league. We boarded the Metro around 9pm thinking we were in plenty of time to beat the crowds but the doors opened and we barely got in.  The noise level was already at a dull roar and we knew we were in for a night of excitement.  Arriving at the stadium, we met crowds of people milling around eating and drinking beer and people in their small kiosks were selling souvenir t-shirts, scarves, soccer balls and anything with Valencia on it plus all kinds of food.  A marching band blared out music on the corner and later at half time.

We found our entrance and my bag was checked for contraband. We asked where we should go and the girl pointed up – way up.  We ended up climbing 169 steps – Jocelyn counted every one of them. Every time we thought we were high enough, we were told to keep going up.  OMG!!!  Thinking that we had purchased  tickets about halfway up, we were a little upset that we had to climb so much. More dreaded stairs!

We finally got to our seats and realized the climb had been worth it.  The view was unbelievable from up there overlooking the bright green of the field against the bright orange of the seats.  The stadium, ranked the 5th largest in Spain, holds 55,000 people and I think about 45,000 seats were filled. The seats were very close together and as much as we are friends we needed space.  We spread out so we had a seat between us and no one showed up to claim the extra seats. What a beautiful warm evening to watch soccer.  The teams were on the field warming up fwhen we arrived but soon left for a break before game time. A huge camera moved back and forth on thick cables across the field moving vertically and horizontally.

The fans arrived in droves.  Noise levels rose and when the Valencia team came on the field the crowds went wild.  Clapping in time, chanting, drumming and cheering, the fans were exuberant, to say the least, and it was chilling to listen to them. The game started and every time the crowds didn’t agree with the refs they started all over with their yelling and animated arm waving.  Joey and I got such a kick out of the guy in front of us waving his arms around in frustration.

Valencia scored the first goal and I wish I could post the video I got so you could all hear the power behind the fans.  It was amazing!  The other team scored and it was all tied up with 10 minutes to go.  We had agreed to leave the game a bit early and beat the crowds to the metro so we left.  We were greeted outside with so much garbage left from the party goers. Cans, flyers, food wrappings and containers, the area was heavily littered. It was a mess for someone to clean up! We only walked a block when  we heard an uproar from inside the stadium and knew Valencia had again scored.

We arrived at the metro only to find out the escalators weren’t working and we had to go down another long flight of stairs. By this time, going down wasn’t much easier than going up. We were the first to arrive when Jocelyn realized that the train wasn’t arriving for another half hour.  By that time, all of the fans caught up to us and it was chaos!  The first train arrived and people pushed and shoved and we had to get out of the way as it wasn’t our train.  We waited for the next one and pushed our way on. Jocelyn wanted to experience the whole evening and she certainly did.  We walked the last few blocks to our flat after the metro and were exhausted when we arrived around 1AM.  The experience was wonderful and we were all glad we did it.  Our beds never felt so good!

I am now a day behind in writing but to tell the truth, the day after travelling home from Mallorca plus the soccer game was VERY long and we simply stayed home the next day so nothing to write about.  Just three sleepy but happy women who had an amazing day together.