Festival Internacional de Benicassim Part 2 of 2 - Spain

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Festival Internacional de Benicássim

Spain


One morning (it was noon, but at this point I think it's fair to say that's morning) I walked back to the bathroom behind three stumbling, tattooed men. I couldn't tell whether they were just coming home from their night out or just getting started. We were at that point in the festival where it just didn't even matter anymore.

Day after day the campsite looked more and more like a war zone. Seeing bodies strewn randomly over the campsite along with the accumulated trash from the night before was nothing rare. People were rarely sleeping inside their tents, even on days it rained. And, despite our hopes for clear, sunny days, it insisted on raining. One afternoon it rained so hard we took in our neighbors, who had nothing more between the two of them than a miniature kiddy play tent they had bought at a toy store for shelter. And the entire time, I'd been thinking it was a dog tent. Turns out actual people slept in there. From that moment on, our original group of five fibbers grew to a group of seven.

Although the relaxation was great, we were all thankful to be motivated once the concert actually started on the fifth day, a Friday. In fact, the countenance of the entire campground changed. People were up a bit earlier from their passed-out positions on various water floating devices, the shower lines weaved and poured outside of the gray bathrooms, and the train whoops and whistles grew even more intense.

Getting to concert grounds was supposed to be as simple as catching the free shuttle from just outside the camp, but the stop was mobbed and the bus didn't come, so we did the 20-minute walk instead. We never figured the bus situation out, but never really tried too hard either.

The shows started early around 4:30pm every day and continued non-stop all day on five different stages until at least 6am. The stages ranged from the main escenario Verde (the green stage) where all the headliners performed, large enough to accommodate the entirety of the concert's attendance for the biggest shows, to the Chill Out Tent, a tarp covered, giant-sized sleepy lounge that played mellow mixes accompanied by mesmerizing tele-images. The latter came in very handy during those tiring lulls between shows and turned out to be a great place for a quick nap.

According to the handy catalogue we had been given, the first day of music we had The Cure on our plate. Having arrived in the afternoon shortly after the concerts began, we struggled to keep the flame alive. We only managed to make it through the first two songs of The Cure set. Walking from show to show and listening to music non-stop had been a much more exhausting process than I had imagined. The 20-minute zombie march home took every last drop of our energy, and we could do nothing but collapse at the campsite.

The next morning, everyone agreed that we needed a new plan of attack. Missing shows because of miserable exhaustion just wouldn't cut it. No one else seemed to be plagued with the same dilemma.

The festival catered to sleepless nights. There was dancing almost all night long on the grounds and there was even a discoteca called The Freezer that opened from 10am to 2pm to make up for the time when the concert was closed. I never saw the inside of the place, or the outside for that matter, but I imagine that it was jumping with people judging from the fact that people seemed to be arriving at the campsite early afternoon, looking haggered from being out all night. This was the norm, but there was no way I was going to be able to keep up. Whoever says that nine days of diversion and entertainment isn't hard is fooling themselves.

Our plan of attack then, was to go in to the grounds a bit later and take a few more breaks. We paced ourselves, didn't try to see everything, and took little siestas on the plots of grass in the concert grounds. The momentum of the music carried us through; The Beta Band, Belle and Sebastian, Paul Weller, Radiohead, and then some. Still, the hike home didn't sound anymore appealing.

So far, though, the music had been great, aside from a few disappointing technical difficulties, one of which forced Thom Yorke of Radiohead to stop dead in the middle of a song, yell a few obscenities, and begin again. Still, we had to take the good with the bad.

The third day of music, we hit up the beach before heading to see the Chemical Brothers to finish up the three-day music set. I cringed afterwards when my thirst forced me to buy a miniature €1.50 bottle of water on the concert grounds. When I returned to my friends who had been previously buried in the standing crowds, they were sitting among a sea of people on the asphalt in front of the stage. The whistles had stopped, and now all that remained were faces drained of energy. We were all filled with a mixture of disappointment and relief that the music was coming to an end.

We tried to stay for the next band, Air, but we couldn't even make it to our feet to listen. It must have been nearing 5 am. I think at one point, as my chin lay in my hands, I actually started to dream. It was time to make that last zombie march home.

The two more days of camping after the shows were over should have been dedicated to recuperation, but the train continued to pass and its whistle was continually transformed into that animating animalistic howl that took over the campground. It was impossible to resist more, more beach, and more play.

Our last day in the campground, I woke up early to the rustling of tents and bustling conversation. The screaming the night before had been the loudest it had been since the beginning. That morning, however, the train's whistle wasn't answered by anything but the lull of sleepy chatter and tent shuddering.

I heard someone say it was 10am, earlier than I'd been up since the whole Benicássim thing had started. When I peeked my head out I saw parts of Tent City disappearing before my eyes. Small groups of fibbers were gathering together their previously scattered possessions, leaving nothing behind mounds of trash as hints of their 9-day residence. There were still mountains of people strewn out on the ground, sleeping off their last Benicássim night. It resembled the aftermath of a hurricane.

Slowly, our group of seven became members of the walking dead. We packed up and headed out of the campground with nothing but coffee on the brain, leaving our plot in Tent City vacant.

As we sat and had our cafes con leche we chatted about our plans to get home, back to Tarifa. Our two kiddy-tent neighbors were headed to Barcelona and the jealousy began to swell among the five of us as they planned their next adventure. All of a sudden, heading home didn't sound quite so glorious. In fact, Barcelona didn't sound too bad at all. Before we knew it we were camped out in front of the Benicássim train station with yellow paper tickets promising a ride to Barcelona in our eager little hands.

The roar of the train as it arrived and pulled away was a welcome, familiar sound. In the end, the momentum of the train had won, but let's admit it, we hadn't really put up much of a fight.