{"id":27079,"date":"2017-04-14T12:02:57","date_gmt":"2017-04-14T11:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ourtour.co.uk\/home\/?p=27079"},"modified":"2021-06-14T12:49:46","modified_gmt":"2021-06-14T11:49:46","slug":"semana-santa-in-andalucia-valle-de-abdalajis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ourtour.co.uk\/home\/semana-santa-in-andalucia-valle-de-abdalajis\/","title":{"rendered":"Semana Santa in Andaluc\u00eda, Valle de Abdalaj\u00eds"},"content":{"rendered":"

Zagan the motorhome’s been well fettled this week, and has settled in alongside the villa we’re house sitting<\/a> near the 3000 inhabitant town of Valle de Abdalaj\u00eds in Andaluc\u00eda, Spain. Ju’s cleaned out half a ton of Saharan sand, which even coated the contents of the under-seat cupboards, having found its way in through air vents. I’ve taken the carpets out and scrubbed ’em, drying them out under the hot sun we’ve had the past few days. I’ve applied a fourth dose of sealing compound to some small leaks we have at the end of the exhaust, and we’ve a few other minor repairs to make. Other than that, I need to clean the under-van lockers from sand, dust and bits of tree, and then Zagan will be spanking gorgeous.<\/p>\n

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It’s Holy Week here in Spain, Semana Santa<\/em>. From high up in the villa, looking down over the terrace to the surrounding olive tree-studded and smooth green wheat fields, the steel-grey rock of the sierra behind the town rises up above us all. We’ve been in the villa a week or so now, and each day the drums have beaten out from the valley, practising in the day before hammering their way around the town at night. Until last night, Maunday Thursday, we’ve stood up here peering down, unable to see anything happening in the twisting, narrow streets below.<\/p>\n

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Street closures for the Holy Week processions. The steep, narrow streets afterwards can be slippy for the cars, especially after rain, as they’re covered in candle wax!<\/p><\/div>\n

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Spain’s been Roman Catholic since, erm, the Romans were here. The 3000-person strong town has a small ethnographic museum with flint arrow heads and tools from the stone age, a stone carved in the Roman era and scenes of donkeys and old tools which look quaint, but which would still be in active use over in Morocco. There wasn’t much in there from the Moorish period, the 700-odd year rule of the Muslims when much of Spain and Portugal were Al-Andalus, but from the sounds of things the village was pretty small in that time. It’s since grown outwards, spreading whitewashed, terracotta-tiled roofs in the lee of the sierra which shades it from the evening sun.<\/p>\n

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Valle de Abdalaj\u00eds in Andaluc\u00eda<\/p><\/div>\n

The Semana Santa processions have been going on, effectively, for ever. Last night we were lucky, the villa owner’s daughter and her Spanish boyfriend took us around the town for a tapas-beer\/procession viewing sandwich. That’s my kind of culture folks! Being sped around the town’s tiny streets in a 46 year old Seat, heading from unpretentious tapas bar to tapas bar, supping cold Cruzcampo and tucking into the tiny, delicious, beer-soaking meals as we went. It seems a stroke of genius to me, to eat steadily while you sup a few drinks, and the quality of the meat, veg and seafood dishes surely beat the choice of crisps, scampi fries and pork scratchings in the pubs back home!<\/p>\n

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There are viewpoints above the town, cut into the rock of the sierra which looms above. This is a paragliding and hand-gliding centre, and we’ve watched shutes gliding across the pale blue sky in the afternoons. The villa’s owner has a hand glider in the garage, tempting… but I quite fancy staying alive a while longer.<\/p><\/div>\n

Knowing we fancied a look at the procession taking place in the town, the Seat flew about the town, with me sweating in the back, thinking of times we’ve got our motorhomes stuck in such intestinal streets across medieval Europe, **shudder**! Finding a tiny parking spot, which didn’t really exist, the four of us stood on a bend just as the procession lumbered into sight. The enormous paso, the float carrying a life-sized Jesus struggling with his crucifixion cross, was carried by a small army of local men in purple shirts and medallions, an agrupaciones<\/i>. These guys are part of a local brotherhood, which could be 800 years old around these parts, and still going strong despite what we were told about how the local youth view religion.<\/p>\n

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A paso being carried in Valle de Abdalaj\u00eds on the night of Maunday Thursday<\/p><\/div>\n

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The agrupaciones ignoring the ‘non-potable’ sign and having a well-earned drink<\/p><\/div>\n

As we watched the white-gloved agrupaciones, <\/i>a bell ring signalled the lowering of the float to the ground. On a street-facing balcony a series of men stood and, hmmm, quietly wailed over the scene below. A hundred people, men, women and children, stood in silence watching, breathing in the incense being wafted around. I’m an atheist, so the religious significance of these events doesn’t apply to me, but the power, history and grace of the thing isn’t lost on me, it was moving to witness, an honour. Once the remorseful wailing was over (with a few eyes being lifted skywards at times in the watching crowd), the bell rang and the float was heaved back onto shoulder. Rocking from side to side like a sleeping baby, Jesus was hauled off up the road, followed by a band. And we hauled ourselves off to the next tapas bar.<\/p>\n

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The first of three singers on the balcony<\/p><\/div>\n