August 15th in Alhama de Granada is the day for the annual Romería del vino, or wine festival. People in the town dress up in their finery and the chosen ones ride in decorated floats or caravans.

The procession consisted of a lot of people on horseback, some horse-drawn carriages and some floats.

a lap of honour…

some fine Andalusian horses

looks comfy

I got there around 10AM and lots of people were already congregating in Plaza del Rey (called Plaza de Alfonso X11 on my map) in the ‘new’ part of the town. The floats were already on display.

There was a Catholic Mass for those interested (mostly, it seemed, the older people; the younger ones were already getting started on the beer) and then the procession was ready to leave.

Someone from the local town hall was available to hand out a ham to the people on each participating float.

The procession travelled to a local picnic area called El Motor, arriving there around 1.30pm, where there were some awards given out for the best floats. Then wine and gazpacho were dished up.

This took us up until around 3.30pm, when the music started.

I didn’t stay late.  Not having the luxury of a horse-drawn carriage to get me to El Motor, I’d had to walk and it was some distance in the heat.

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