Hogueras de San Juan: how Alicante burns in June

At 14:00 on June 20, the Luceros square holds its breath. A whistle, a first explosion that tears open the air, and for five minutes the whole city hangs suspended in a rhythm of gunpowder you do not hear: you feel it in your chest. That is a mascletà. And that is just the beginning.

The Hogueras de San Juan are Alicante's biggest festival. From June 20 to 24 the city literally burns, and then from June 25 to 29 it keeps burning in the form of fireworks displays over the Postiguet beach. If you are thinking of moving to the Costa Blanca, these nights in June are a crash course in what this city actually means.

A young festival with an old root

The first document that mentions bonfires in the streets of Alicante is a municipal decree from 1822 forbidding them. For decades the tradition survived unofficially, until in 1881 the city council forgot to publish the ban and the neighbours reclaimed the street with music, games, and the first ninots, satirical figures pointing fingers at the powerful of each district.

The modern festival was born on March 22, 1928. That day the Alicante Atracción society called a meeting to invent, from scratch, a celebration that could draw tourism to the city. The project was led by José María Py y Ramírez de Cartagena, a painter and sculptor from Cádiz who had settled in Alicante after watching the Fallas take shape in Valencia. In June 1928 nine bonfires burned. The one from Benalúa won the first contest.

Today the Hogueras have been declared a Festival of International Tourist Interest since 1983 and Intangible Cultural Heritage by Decree 222/2014 of the Generalitat Valenciana. Nearly two hundred commissions plant monuments every June. Benacantil watches from above, as it has done for centuries.

June 20: the plantà

The big festival kicks off with the plantà. During the night of June 20 to 21, each commission finishes building its bonfire in the street. Monuments of cardboard and wood, some over fifteen metres tall, appear where the previous day there was only asphalt. By morning, when you open the window, your neighbourhood has changed.

There is an official adult bonfire in the Town Hall square and a children's one beside it. They set the pace for the central acts. But the festival truly lives in the districts. Walking from Raval Roig to the market, climbing up to San Blas, crossing to Benalúa, is touring an open-air exhibition that will never exist in the same form again.

Every day at 14:00: the mascletà

From June 19 onwards, over the six central days, the Luceros square hosts the mascletà contest at noon. Twelve pyrotechnic companies compete to fire the densest daytime show on the Spanish calendar after Valencia. Each display costs more than 8,500 euros. There is no colour, no image: only rhythm, smoke, and a shockwave you learn to hear through your ribs.

Locals arrive before 13:30, fill every balcony, plug their ears with their fingers, and wait. At 14:00 sharp it begins. Five minutes later, applause drowns out the last firecrackers.

In between: offerings, proclamations, parades

The week weaves in ceremonial acts worth the walk. The Flower Offering to the Virgin of the Remedy runs along Alfonso el Sabio, Rambla de Méndez Núñez, San José, the Concathedral of San Nicolás, Rafael Altamira and the Town Hall square. Thousands of belleas and ladies in traditional dress lay bouquets at the feet of the city's patron. The Entry of Bands crosses Luceros and comes down the Rambla to the Town Hall. On the final day the Coso Multicolor parade floods Alfonso X el Sabio with coloured confetti before the closing fireworks castle.

Midnight on June 24: the palmera and the cremà

This is the moment. At 00:00 on June 25, from the summit of Mount Benacantil above the Santa Bárbara castle, the palmera is fired. Around 1,150 pearl-white rockets cascade over the city for eighteen seconds. The tradition was born in 1932 and it is the starting gun for the nit de la cremà.

After the palmera, the official children's bonfire goes up first, then the official adult one in the Town Hall square, and the districts burn their monuments one by one. Firefighters keep the blaze under control with high-pressure hoses and, in the same motion, soak the public. That is the banyà: the Alicante way of surviving the heat and celebrating the most intense moment of the night. Cold water, ash in the air, drenched people singing. In 2024, the water at the official banyà was dyed green as part of a glass-recycling campaign run with Ecovidrio.

June 25 to 29: fireworks castles at the Postiguet

Once the bonfires are embers, the festival changes stage. Five nights in a row, Postiguet beach hosts the international fireworks contest. This year the launches are planned from the sand, at the height of Paseíto Ramiro. Each castle runs at least fifteen minutes and is budgeted at around 19,000 euros.

The beach fills hours in advance. Families with blankets, neighbours on the promenade, tourists with phones raised. At midnight the streetlights on the seafront go dark and the Mediterranean gives back the reflection of every burst. Benacantil stays behind, dark and watching.

The racós: where the festival actually lives

A hoguera is not only the monument that burns. It is also a racó, a fenced outdoor space in the street where each commission sets tables, cooks, and dances all night. You eat coca de atún, brevas and rice dishes, you drink local wine and paloma, you listen to live music. Commissions sell tables and wristbands to anyone who wants to join, and several central districts open places to residents and visitors without an assigned commission.

A recent court ruling confirmed that racós and barracas have priority over bar terraces during the festival. The Hogueras belong to the street. The bars, during these nights, adjust to it.

The ninot indultat and the museum

Before the plantà, every commission enters a ninot, a figure representative of its monument, in a collective exhibition. The public votes. The ninot indultat, the most voted, is saved from the flames and joins the permanent collection of the Hogueras Museum, housed in the Casa de la Festa on Rambla de Méndez Núñez. It is a way to walk through a century of festival in a single room. If you visit outside June, it is the natural entry point.

How to live it if you are not from here

A few practical notes from the local experience. Book accommodation months ahead: the Casco Antiguo, Benalúa and the historic centre fill first. Carry soft silicone earplugs for the mascletà. Dress light, bring a change of clothes for the banyà and shoes you are ready to ruin with ash. Map out a couple of racós open to the public and plan each day around the 14:00 mascletà and the evening programme.

And above all, take your time. A Hoguera is not something you watch: you walk it, smell it, hear it. You carry gunpowder on your clothes for days, and the Mediterranean is right there, waiting on the other side.

If you want to meet Alicante in its most alive version, June is the week. And if you are looking for a home from which to live all of this every year, you can explore our properties in the old town, Benalúa or Postiguet, or contact us so we can help you find it.