The craziest festival is back!

Everyone who knows me since January last year have heard me talk about this festival. Every single one. Like I introduce myself, i ask if you go to festivals and if the answer is positive there is a good chance my next question is: «Have you ever been to Latin Dance Festival? It’s hands down the best festival I’ve ever been». My close friends have heard this at least ten times trying to get them to join this year and I really wanted to put my money where my mouth is and first day after the festival in 2021 i bought the full pass for this year. I haven’t done this for any other festival. Nor El sol, Nor Benidorm nor Sensual Week. That’s how good it was but now… one year has gone by and now the event was approaching and some doubts started to cross my mind…

Was it good because we were coming from COVID festivals where everyone had to wear masks? Are they going to mess it up like they did Latin Summer first edition(same organizers same place but in summer). To sum it up, would it be able to hold the crown they were holding for me last year?

Wanna skip to the conclusions? click here

My name is César and this is my dance advisor review of the Latin Dance Festival 2022.

My take on the festival

To know what are the scoring criteria for a festival and what’s my particular take when I go to festivals, click here.

I travel a lot for festivals and several of my close friends have told me that they’ve never seen me so excited and so happy than after coming back from this festival last year. I just had the best experience I could get in a festival. Well organized, added value, and most important of all, amazing vibes. If I ever make a festival I would try to do it exactly in the same way they have done it in 2021. That’s how good it was, and some people ask me… «Why?? why it’s so good? Why it’s different to all the others like El Sol, Bachata Spain or Benidorm Summer.» This is what I’m going to try to convey along the way in words but trust me, this is a very difficult thing as the best feelings, the same as the best dances, cannot be described just with words.

The main «gimmick» of this festival and what sets it aparts are the «secret parties». These parties are afternoon parties that take place at the same time as workshops. They don’t announce them in social media, you just need to know. Last year, people with flyers went into the classes and said when and where you needed to be and then everything was communicated through the attendants by word of mouth. «But César, every festival have afternoon/beach/pool parties, this is not something new» And I would say you are totally correct, but sometimes the most important thing about something is not the something. Is how you provide or sell it. Giving them the aura of mystery of the secret party, having it not announced but transmitted word to mouth, keeps you guessing and engaged… All of this add to the magic and vibe of the event and when you get to the first secret party… it doesn’t let you down. But I’m getting ahead of myself…

Djs & Lineup

Workshops

So my purpose for this festival was to do some classes(maybe one a day). «Wow», you must say, «like that’s not a lot, fellah. 4 days, 4 classes.» Welp, for those who have read the scoring criteria article, this must not come as a surprise, because my main priorities are these afternoon parties, i feel that’s where people who really like to dance come to and with no other pretenses.

This event has amazing artist lineup coming(mainly for salsa) as well and I hoped to make at least 4 classes and… well, I didn’t do a single one. Yes. I know. Not a single one. Sue me. I was too busy dancing the whole afternoon and night and then just had enough time to sleep and eat. I recommend you not to be like me and take at least 3 or 4 classes 😀

DJs

I have to say I am unable to find the full lineup of the DJ’s, and I am quite more knowledgeable about the Bachata Djs than the salsa one so I will just talk about my experience. DJ Husky is a safe bet. You know that when he is in the room you are going to get good bachata sensual & moderna, including some remixes, and if you are up to this alley, the music it’s perfect. DJ Killo was the one who just loves to dance and to party as much as us, the one making it to the end and knowing when to settle down and put some slow music… when it’s 6 am and you are closing the night after 6 hours of dancing in the third night, you say thanks for that. He’s a relatively unknown DJ with a good rythm and also knows how to play Salsas as well. I just went to the salsa room 2 or 3 times but didn’t enjoy it as it was either too full so you could not dance or too empty because it was too late and no good dancer could be found (understandable as salsa is more tiring than bachata).

9/10

Location

The location is NOT Barcelona, this is always the case with BCN events, it’s either Santa Susana or Lloret de Mar, and unlike Santa Susana which, let’s be honest, the hotel is quite awful, this one it’s worth the trip. But plan it, there are certain shuttles going from BCN airport and Barcelona Nord but there are not many and of course they run out of seats because everyone in the festival takes them. If you don’t take them you are stuck with more than 2 hours of bus and transfers so really plan your flight/trip ahead of time and with this shuttle into account(Yeah, we know because we didn’t know before so don’t make the same mistake -.-‘) . You can check in either https://compras.moventis.es/online/ or in the festival page for shuttles from airport and BCN.

7/10

Venue

This is one of the biggest highlights of the event for me and a huge contributing factor for this unique vibe this event creates. It’s a 4 hotel resort and in December they have the full hotel for themselves as I guess there must be no tourism by that time and it does a lot for the whole immersion experience: you are never running into people looking at you awkwardly for being a dancer or not understanding what’s going on. All of them share your same addiction and more important, you get to have neighbours with the same sleeping habits as you, so preparties are not an issue, the hotel is not shutting down preparties because a neighbour is complaining about noise and getting up early, everyone just walks around and find its way. I do think that they don’t let people from outside go up to the rooms during the night so if you are not staying on the hotel take this into account.

It is a HUGE venue, 4 different hotels mean that you will be lost the first 2 days until you get used to it, there are 3 different restaurants depending on where you sleep and the main issue is that there is a big gap in quality between the 4 hotels in regards to the size and luxury of the rooms. They go from 2 huge king size bed WITH another room for a sofa to… not enough space to open your luggage. In any case, this time we got lucky and got the big room but this is the biggest «nuisance» I have with this event. It seems like they are rebuilding the oldest hotel and maybe after that all of them are at least «ok».

9/10

Vibes

I’ve already introduced the biggest grounbreaker of these festivals, their secret parties… But What is so important about them? One of them is the unique locations where they take part that you would never suspect: an empty pool, the parking lot or an actual pool party with foam, animations and craziness… in December with 5ºC outside… People ask me if this is just for party people, saying «ok, i don’t mind people partying but I’m not a party person». Well, I am not either, trust me, I don’t drink alcohol, I don’t smoke and I’ve never enjoyed a normal party outside dancing, but this festival is different, you find yourself in the middle of the pool party(yeah, dont forget your bathing suit) clapping to an animation when you just hate animations. You get sucked by this tribal energy that it’s so hard to describe and that gets you in the middle of there surrounded by hundreds of people doing the same as you or dancing to the songs and you can’t help but enjoy it. I would say if you are not a party person, give it a try anyway, you won’t be dissapointed…

Another thing that really helps is the crazy dress codes that people really go way beyond reasonable to comply with them so if you don’t want to feel out of place, check the dress codes… complying makes the night feel like a circus but in a good way.

Adrián is crazy and he will make anything that he’s a part of very enjoyable for everyone as he is a showman. I don’t enjoy shows and he makes them enjoyable, he has this charisma that this world needs so much and he really brings the experience to the utmost as you are always wondering… «what is he going to do next??» And it’s always crazier than the last thing he did. Just as a note, he likes to dress up a lot, so be ready to watch some crazy ninja or drag queen hosting the night shows…

The last thing I want to comment is how they get the whole immersion feeling, this is what makes it truly special, they are selling us an experience, which is something that every other festival doesn’t know how to do. They just get a stage, a dancefloor and artists and expect it to work… This immersion though, i think it belongs to the next section.

11/10

Organization

Another of the highlights of this festival. Even if the festival is huge and they always talk about LDF is for partying, for it to be a good party with those many participants(1800+ people) you need to have incredibly good logistics. The hotel keeps improving this every year, distributing the people as they come to different restaurants, opening the breakfast as soon as the social dancing is over, but specially the secret parties are very well thought and with amazing commitment and immersion. A party where we celebrated the world Cup of soccer, with the staff wearing referee outfits, whistles and all, you had to wear something of your country, and dancing in the parking slot because «it’s a secret party» it’s very charming and much more enticing than your average «yeah, afternoon party with a DJ». People embrace this vibe like no other festival, enjoying a good animation or joining for some forbidden steps with the animators. And things like this happens, with no alcohol in sight so it’s just people having fun together…you just gotta try!

10/10

Price

Full pass for 4 days of party, including 3 secret parties and 4 night parties it’s a bargain, it’s true that it’s more expensive than the rest of Spain(usually one day less of party as well) but the quality of the lineup, the DJs and the experience itself it’s more than worth it. The 4 nights in the hotel in a double room was 212€ per person taken with time so 53€ a night with full board sounds quite fair, it’s a 4 star-hotel with some drawbacks. I go into details in the Venue section but the main issue is this is a resort of 4 hotels which even if they are all 4 stars, one of them is quite luxury and then as you go further in the hotel the rooms are worse and worse. Nonetheless, it seems like the bad one is being rebuilt so hopefully the gap between the hotels become less noticeable for the experience.

9/10

Dance level

Why this festival is the best for me? Take into account I haven’t talked for the dance level for a second. And it’s because for me in this festival it doesn’t matter as much. The vibes are set in such a nice way and people are enjoying the parties so much that the «dance level» goes up just by inertia. The immersion and vibes and how much value they put into everything they do makes it so that who you dance with at night doesn’t matter. Or put in a better way, it means that people are ready to connect and have fun, as opposed as to in other festivals where other stuff is more important.This is not the case for any other festival. The reality nowadays is that for every other festival when it’s over I’m not thinking about the venue or the djs, I’m thinking… did i have good dancers/dances? And that’s a little bit sad as the festivals don’t do anything to bring you value, besides classes and parties. This festival really takes it to the next level with everything discussed above, and just for the sake of completion, i would say that the dance level last year was better at least in bachata(it’s a more national festival than international), nonetheless, in salsa I had all amazing dances but i didn’t dance as much salsa(as usual).

9/10

Anecdotes

I just went all-in in this festival, man. We got a Goofy outfit for the disney dress code, a gladiator for the circus(Roman circus), I got kicked out for dancing salsa in the soccer party, and we were the first one there to enjoy the empty pool party and the actual pool party, so I can say I enjoyed it to the fullest and the only way to make it justice is with a small video of the whole experience:

[The video was deleted and cannot find it again :\]

Conclusion

Good dancing level, secret parties, secret dress codes, total immersion…. You won’t be dissapointed… the first time. I have to say, this one was not as good as the last one. So it’s an amazing festival and it will keep being my #1 recommended festival for everyone to visit but it’s true that all the secret parties where the same place as last year so they were not as «WOW, WHAT ARE WE DOING INSIDE AN EMPTY POOL?, THIS IS CRAZYYY» as the first time, so if I had one thing for this festival to improve is to keep reimagining dancing and keep giving us this wow factor.

is this festival for you? If you don’t mind everyone speaking Spanish, then definitely yes. This festival sets the standard on how a festival should be run. Period.

I just hope more international people come to check it and raise the cache of the event even more, even though it’s not its market because this festival is sold out every year just with Spanish people and word of mouth of how good it is. They are self-proclaimed the best event of the year and at the end, I just have to agree. But I hope they don’t sleep on their success, there are things to work on and there’s always a need to keep wowing the people coming to this festival, that’s how they got me hooked.

The final score for this festival is 9.5/10.

This has been the review for the Bachata Sensual World Congress 2023, if you were there and think i missed on something or you are curious about going next year, feel free to leave me a comment in the post or my social media.

Until next time, thanks for reading,

César.