Hoy Romería!
When señoras get out their frilly frocks and men strut around in rather tight trousers on their horses.
And the village is deserted as everyone takes to the road on some vague Catholic pilgrimage.
What really happens is that, everyone starts drinking early. Spanish even get out of bed before mid-day for this big day in the year. In fact, looking at some of their gear, half of them must have been up by 5am.
Naturally, lots of people meet down the bar. Especially the ones taking part who are riding horses, or guiding the bueys, because it really doesn’t matter if they are drinking does it?
Years back when we first bought our house, the parade came past our house. This year we were abandanada so I had to walk down the high street to watch it.
Like me, you may think the Spanish are amazingly disorganised and late for everything, mañana mañana. But no. Caravans and horses all lined up waiting for Cristo to come out of the church, and then with a twirl, everything was turned round to join the procession. With amazing precision. Have you tried manouevring horses or bueys?
One minute they were facing in one direction, and the next, ready to go.
I’d asked Adelina what time it was starting – 9.30? No, nueve con cinco, or diez. I looked at the time, five to nine. I didn’t have long so I cleared off.
First the handsome bueys.
Bueys
Aren’t they adorable? Best not to get in their way, last year someone was practising for the Romeria and a couple of them plus cart crashed into him. He died.
A couple of local boys. Not bueys. Maybe not so adorable.
Hello mate
The carts, full of food and drink. Those milk churns? Doubt they are holding milk.
Milk in that churn?
Up to the church, and here we have Jesus. Waiting to go. Been loaded in his cart and he’s off on the jolly. A quick stop at the puente for some scran, a bit of a stop at another church, and then we can all clear off to the nice playground for the rest of the day. (Not us, we cleared off to Gib).
Jesus
The three musketeers. On the left, holding the flag of Andalucia (my neighbour, of which more here) in the middle the local church flag, and on the right, the Spanish flag.
Processing down Main Street
My neighbour with the Andalucian flag
Busy street.
Busy busy busy
And a couple of vids. First one is very short, but the second one is slightly longer if you want more of the same. I wanted to share the music and drums…. well and the general noise of course.
great :)
thanks!
education and entertaining, plus good read. what more can I ask for….ice cream and jelly…lol. thanks for share.;)
Romeria is about pix, music and atmosphere, that’s all I was trying to capture in a few shots.
Looks like a lot of fun. Firmly on my to do list is to visit Spain for the Semana Santa – any recommendations on where to go?
Got to be one of the big Andalucían ones. Seville and Málaga compete with each other, Granada slightly behind, never hear about Cordoba, but Cadiz and Almeria do pretty good jobs too. (i’ve seen ‘em all on the telly). Even the local towns do a good job of it.
Anyway, I’ve actually been to Málaga and it was superb. So I can easily recommend that, plus, cheap flights? What more can you ask for? But the planning for the whole thing needs to be meticulous, and fails anyway ‘cos they always run late. Málaga also gives you the chance to escape elsewhere if you get sick of Semana Santa. I’ll try and rescue some pix and write a post.
Good advice – thanks!
I forgot to say it can be pretty claustrophobic and you may want to go in one direction but the crowd is so packed you have to go in the direction of the crowd….
Such contrast to life in the UK eh?
Heh!! Don’t even think about that any more as it is such a part of normal life now!
But living in the UK is different – nothing wrong with that! I used to think I would like to move away to Spain or France or Greece but now I am not so sure! My ideal scenario? A good quality motor home for a few months and then go back to UK!
Nothing wrong with the UK as a place, just the crackpot govts and crazy legislation that exists. You need V’s motor home but I bet it’s not for loaning out :D
Way cool! I especially liked some of the dresses caught in the first video.
The frocks are something else. Will stick up a slideshow tomorrow.
Love all the colors and excitement.. Great pictures and vids..
Looks like a great time was had by all!!!
You’ve summed it up so well, it really is about colour and excitement. Such enthusiasm.
I love this, the photos and words remind me of things i have seen. It captures the excitement, joy, tension, exuberence of the day. Another ticky star thing then.
Thanks. Ticky star or gold star? I am a gold star person me. Actually it was full of exuberance. A good word. No idea what it is in Spanish.
Ticky and goldy, exuberancia according to google translate, ;)
Oh goody. Thanks for that. I got rid of the stars on here a while ago, thought they looked too gimmicky. I should have guessed exuberancia. Not beyond the wit of roughseas to have had a stab at that. I may even look it up in the dictionary. One day.
Oooh, it was like I was there! Thank you RSITM!
So which one were you? One of the older fatter guys leading the bueys? The tall slim gitano with the gitane in his mouth? The television reporter? Or one of the observers watching it all go by?
It was quite fun. Because we have normally been graced with it coming past our house, I’ve only been up to the start once or twice, so it was really atmospheric.
I was observing whilst hovering on the astral plane miles above it all….
:D
Thanks so much for the videos! So much fun. (Just goes to show if something’s important, you can get up early – HA). Of course the Andalusian Horses are so important there. Can’t wait to see the frocks.
Losing the will to live ploughing through the other pix for a slideshow – ’twill be tomorrow though now. Not a fashionista me, but I do have some comments to make about them :D
Looks like such a good time! The bueys are my personal favorite :)
They are such huge placid animals. They are meant to be pretty expensive so I am surprised there are still so many around.
Great post. You certainly accomplished your aim of capturing the pix, music and atmosphere, and I particularly loved the bueys & the Jesus wagon. The music certainly has impact. After listening for a while through my headset, I took the headset off and could still hear it trilling away. How lovely to be, and even better to live there.
Thanks. They used to have a different tune for the pipes which was beautifully haunting. I’ve not heard it for a few years. Must be like the frocks, they must change the musical fashions too.
that looks like a fab procession…would have loved to see it