The nightlife and the best party places in Salamanca

Salamanca is a university city and as such, its centre is full of pubs, bars and party places. If you decide to spend your Erasmus here, I can guarantee that you will not get disappointed any bit from the nightlife, and you will have an eventful semester that you will never forget.

I spent my Erasmus year in a little Scottish town next to Glasgow, where there was only one club plus a Student Union close to our accommodation, and thus, we often had to take the so called Erasmus party bus that drove us to Glasgow to enter one of the most popular places for Erasmus students.

Despite the fact that we still managed to party the hell out of ourselves, yet, in Salamanca, everything looks different, and your problem will be more likely to choose among the abundance of clubs: there are a bunch of different party quarters where you can spend your studying-free nights. The youngsters of Salamanca can start the fun already on Wednesday, but even if they don’t, on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays for sure you will find all the clubs crowded and half of the alumni on the streets drinking, talking and enjoying their life. Does this sound crazy and cool? Yes, it is – and even more when you get to experience it. So in this post, my aim is to guide you through the maze of the Spanish clubs known here as “discotecas”.

The first area is called La Cocina (translates to English as The Kitchen), and it covers the area of the Plaza de San Juan Bautista, not even five minutes away from El Toscano, which is a tapas bar at the other end of Calle de Zamora but more importantly a key and well-known meeting point of the city. In La Cocina you can find bars that serve all kinds of cocktails, but what they are most famous for is that they offer a vast amount of “chupitos” (shots) for a very reasonable price.

Another very popular party area in Salamanca is Bordadores (in English Embroiderers), and is situated about 200 meters away from the Plaza Mayor, in a street called the same, Calle Bordadores. As for me, this is definitely one of the highlights of the nightlife in the city, because it is in these bars where most exchange students – and foreign students in general – get together. These clubs are good choices to spend your night for many reasons; such as the music they play (it includes recent hits, funky music and even reggaeton), the extravagant and affordable drinks (with bizarre names such as “Diablo” or “Sex on the Beach”) and specially the thematic parties they organise each Tuesday night, which are usually dedicated to different countries, like Belgium, Germany, Netherland, Ireland etc. If you love to meet people from all around the world, this is the party quarter I would highly recommend. My favourite places to go out on a Thursday night in this area are the Camelot, the Gastby and the Zhivago, because they have an immensely pleasurable atmosphere.

The third quarter I will talk about covers the whole Gran Vía, the main road in Salamanca. It is really good because if you don’t like one club or the other, you can just leave and check out the one right next to it. The best places in this are according to me – or more like by my boyfriend who took me to all of them, leaving not much choice to form my own opinion – are the De laval genoves (El Submarino), the Bender and the Molly Mallone. The first one is a club that looks like a ship - this is where its name comes from. They play English music, mostly rock, like Arctic Monkeys or U2, so if you are not the biggest fan of Spanish music, this is the right place for you. For example, on our Halloween night, after a small flatparty, this was the club we ended up.

In case you do like Spanish rock music, I recommend you to go to Pakipalla. It is a considerably big place with cheap drinks, but it is not my style. The second place, the Bender, is in reality most of the time not to my taste, as they play many mainstream songs, but sometimes they play reggaeton as well, which is a music stlye I like a lot. (Although not many Spaniard will tell you the same. ) For what it is worth, I always had a good time there. Finally, the last place mentioned the Molly Mallone, which is “only” a pub, but anytime my boyfriend wants to meet his friends, they organize the meeting there. I have been there too various times, and it is a very nice Irish pub, where the inhabitants of Salamanca go to warm up for the party. They have special offers of “pintas” from Monday to Friday.

An important information you need to bear in mind before entering a club in Salamanca is that although all the places are free, there is an unwritten rule according to which you are expected to consume. Of course, when the places are full, this really cannot be controlled, but in a less popular place and on a less crowded day, you might get an angry look if you leave the place without buying any drinks.

Also good to know that most bars organize beerpong on Mondays – I guess in order to attract as many visitors as they can in spite of the fact that it is the first working day of the week. Yet, you will actually get surprised how many people decide to conquer the night even on Monday.

Finally, find here the exact addresses of the places I described above so that you will find them for sure:

• Camelot: Calle de los Bordadores, 3
• Gatsby: Calle de los Bordadores, 16
• Zhivago: Crespo Rascón, 2, 37002
• El Submarino: Calle San Justo, 27
• Bender: Calle Varillas, 11
• Pakipalla: Calle San Justo, 27
• Molly Malone: Calle Gonzala Santana, 7

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