Travel Stories: The Worst Party Ever

Location: Salamanca, Spain 2015

PART #1: After participating in a poorly coordinated Halloween bar crawl, we couldn’t turn down the chance for one last Spanish party. Especially when it was offered as a way to make up for our bad experience. We “graduated” from our study abroad semester just in time to book it to the train and head to meet our bus in Madrid. Little did we know this bus would transport us to quite possibly the worst night of our lives.

PART #2: We rode the bus to Salamanca, a city where thousands of college age students gathered to ring in the new year before heading home for the holidays. We listened to the DJ in the square, ate our grapes as the clock struck midnight and danced the night away as we hopped from bar to bar. Pretty soon, the fun evening turned into a scene straight out of the purge. Girls were wailing about how their phones had been stolen, there were people vomiting around every corner and the whole town was covered in garbage. All we could think about was how to escape this nightmare.

PART #3: With nowhere to go, we decided to try walking back to our bus to wait out the remainder of the cold night in comfort. Unfortunately, our bus was not where we left it, and we quickly found out it wouldn’t be returning until 5am. Alright, we’ll find a hotel lobby to wait in….we were quickly kicked out by the desk attendants. To stay warm in the freezing temps, we huddled in the hotel windowsill while a steady stream of people asked us if we were homeless and needed a place to stay for the night (bless them).

PART #4: The bus finally arrived around 5am after hours of teeth chattering. The best part? They refused to let anyone on until our tour leaders arrived. By now, there was quite a group of people tired of being stuck in Salamanca all night, and you can bet that some choice words were thrown at the driver. Finally, we were allowed to board and fall asleep in comfort…until we were woken up by the last group of rowdy partiers who kept falling down and threw up right next to us. We spent the next few hours riding home to the smell of puke and the sound of drunk people….our last night of partying turned into our worst night in Spain.