Events calendar Pyrénées-Orientales

Under the impetus of the Casa Musicale and the Region and since 1997, the festival was born from the idea of a free event for all highlighting the amateur musicians of the region. Today, Ida y Vuelta has become a must-see event in Perpignan, attracting more than 20,000 people during four days. It features renowned artists but also local, with rock, rap, pop, salsa, metal, hip-hop, world music and drums in the Bronx, without forgetting the Catalan rumba.

Welcome to the highest fortified city in France: you are here at 1,600 meters above sea level! His ramparts impress you? There is something: their construction requisitioned no less than 4,000 men, and the construction site lasted two years! According to Vauban's plans in the seventeenth century, they are still very well maintained, which has earned them a UNESCO World Heritage inscription. The walk to the family invites you to discover them. Then, after a walk of about 2 kilometers, you will eventually be able to offer a guided tour of the citadel and its sinks well; find out about this with the Tourist Office.

Tariff: free of charge.

Distance: 2.1 km.

Difficulty: easy.

With its flowered floats, its balls and its animations, the Carnival of Amélie-les-Bains is one of the most beautiful and popular carnivals of the Pyrénées-Orientales. Known since the ^19th century under the name of cavalcade, the carnival sees crowds in jubilation. The most astonishing moment remains the parade of the "Grégoire améliens": penitents dressed in white, bury the Grégoire, the Carnival Majesty, by walking him through the city before burning him in the public square.

The village of Prats de Mollo la Preste is every year the theater of a traditional and singular carnival. To celebrate the imminent return of spring, the villagers disguise themselves as bears, the emblematic animal of the region. They put on a sheepskin and cover themselves with soot. Armed with clubs, these bears start a wild saraband and lead in a crazy farandole. Three days of carnival festivities including the parade of the Carnival Majesties.

Firmly rooted in the traditions of Vallespir, this festival attracts a crazy world every year. In the pagan ritual of the passage from winter to spring, two men dressed as bears enter the village, chasing onlookers and terrorizing young girls. The hunters then organize a hunt and the chase begins through the streets of the village until the final capture and the mock execution... while the crowd celebrates and dances. Unique and fantastic!

In February of each year, 3 Catalan villages in the Pyrénées-Orientales region celebrate a very old carnival festival, which has now become a traditional festival: the Bear Festival. The origin of these festivities lies in the legend of a ferocious bear who, in search of a mate, decides to kidnap a local girl. In Arles-sur-Tech, Prats-de-Mollo-La-Preste and Saint-Laurent-de-Cerdans, you'll have the chance to attend a unique, festive and transgressive event in the heart of the Catalan countryside, where you can rediscover local customs such as the sardana.

Since 1994, the Festival International des Arts du Verre has brought together renowned exhibitors and artists in picturesque premises in the old village, with an emphasis on glassblowing techniques and contemporary creations. Exhibitions, initiations and demonstrations by internationally renowned master glassmakers enliven the heart of the village. All forms of glass art are represented, to introduce the general public to this special art in all its forms.