Going to a Spanish music festival in a non-Spanish speaking country can now be checked off my bucket list because it was totally there the whole time. Obviously.

I heard about the Reggaeton beach festival in November and bought my tickets shortly after because por qué no? It was planned for the weekend after Europe tour which was a little concerning but you can never do too much right? In this case, right. The truth is it was impossible to turn down a day of listening to Spanish DJ's play music I've been listening to all year with my exchange friends. Now that it's over I can say I have absolutely no regrets. The festival was awesome.

I rode the train with a few exchange friends to Cologne and once we got there we met up with even more exchange kids before all walking to the festival together. Before entering I did face paint for a bunch of people because you can't go to a festival without face paint right?

The line to get in was a mile long and well, we weren't exactly on time.When we finally got in the music had been playing for two hours already. It was no problem though, we just started dancing as soon as we made it through the gates. These were our jams.

To those who are interested/confused/don't care but they have to read until the end, reggaeton is not to be confused with reggae music. It's a fairly new music style done in Spanish, occasionally with some English mixed in. It's influenced by hip-hop and Latin American and Caribbean music. Some popular artists include Nicky Jam, Daddy Yankee, J Balvin, and Zion y Lennox.

The festival was held on the Rhein river with a literal white sand beach and a big stage. The beach had recliner chairs and there were lots of stands to buy (overpriced) drinks. I sat for a little while on the "beach" but spent most of the time as close to the stage as possible without getting pummeled by the people more hardcore than me. Eight hours of dancing. What more could I ask for? How about no school the next day. Yup, I got that too. Thanks Germany.

Kale out