Having watched the Easter celebrations three years ago in Valencia, in the old town, near the sea front, involving long processions of hooded figures, statues and bands and a wonderful neighbourly atmosphere, we were keen to see what other towns and cities do at Easter.

As a student, I had visited Santiago de Compostela and Zamora at Easter time, so I put together a nostalgia trip of an Easter break for 2005.

We flew to Madrid, picked up a hire car and once we’d found the right road (M40) drove to Avila. This is a wonderful, historic town with the best preserved medieval city walls in Europe, from which you get terrific views of the surrounding countryside and close-ups of the storks on their ramshackle nests on every available perch. Our hotel was the faded-grandeur Palacio Valderrábanos, (http://www.palaciovalderrabanoshotel.com/) directly opposite the west front of the cathedral from which emerged a procession that evening (martes santo: the Tuesday before Easter). Last thing at night, we heard drum beats and looked down from our room to see another, much smaller procession going by, the penitentes all dressed in black, and with a man carrying a cross, a heavy chain dragging from one ankle.

The next day we drove to Santiago de Compostela: a long drive, but the roads were fairly empty. We stayed in the very central Hotel Airas Nunes: (www.pousadasdecompostela.com) only two star, but very comfortable, with well-designed rooms making the most of original features and with a view of one of the cathedral towers. Santiago being the culmination of the Camino de Santiago, the pilgrim route which runs across northern Spain, there were plenty of backpackers, but they mainly seemed to be Spanish: we hardly encountered any English speakers the entire holiday. Santiago is a wonderfully atmospheric city and the cathedral is quite breathtaking with baroque decoration inside and out. There were several processions a day, with parishioners following the pasos as well as the hooded penitentes. One procession even involved the amazing feat of carrying the statues down the cathedral steps: it was hardly surprising they got a round of applause afterwards! We also listened to a Tuna group performing live: university students singing medieval love songs (and La Cucaracha!) It did rain a bit, but everywhere was geared up for it: every bar and restaurant had an umbrella stand, and many of the streets were lined with portales or covered walkways.

On Easter Saturday we drove to Zamora where there was a procession on the Saturday night when the women of one particular cofradía or brotherhood, dressed in black cloaks and carrying lanterns, accompany a statue of Mary through the streets. The following morning, a different statue of Mary and one of Christ are paraded on different routes until they meet in the main square, accompanied by parishioners carrying staves adorned with fresh flowers. The people of Zamora are very proud of their pasos and display them in a museum when they are not in use.

Our final stop was one night in Salamanca, a beautiful, honey-coloured city of dreaming spires and imposing façades in the plateresco style. We stayed in the Hotel Rector: (www.hotelrector.com) a magnificently refurbished old building with views of the city wall and cathedrals – yes, plural! Salamanca has an old cathedral with a new one adjoining it, although the ‘new’ one dates from the C18th. The main square is similar to Madrid’s but more symmetrical, more delicate. We visited the university, with the lecture rooms of literary greats Fray Luis de León and Miguel de Unamuno. We also had a guided tour of the Convento de Santa Clara, with its C14th wall paintings and C13th painted beams conserved above an eighteenth century false ceiling and viewable from aluminium walkways and bridges. The old cathedral also contains murals, still amazingly bright in colour and a cloister, some of which suffered damage in the 1755 Lisbon earthquake.

The most striking features of the holiday? The sheer amount of people involved in the Easter processions, the Brobdingnagian scale of the buildings in Santiago and Salamanca, the pterodactyl-like storks everywhere, collecting nesting material and the friendliness and helpfulness of practically everyone we encountered.

Back to top

Link not working? Please let us know at info@tailormadelanguages.com