New Semana Santa tourist walk in Jumilla to relive the Easter processions all year round

A 1500-metre route recreates the steps followed by Penitents on the Tuesday before Easter in Jumilla

The Easter Week processions and celebrations in Jumilla date back at least 600 years, placing them among the oldest in Murcia, and have been awarded International Tourist Interest status due to their rich artistic heritage, colour, the devotion and enthusiasm they inspire and the traditions which have evolved over six centuries of processions.

One of the highlights of the week, and perhaps the most solemn of the processions, takes place on the Tuesday before Easter, which is a day of penitence in Jumilla: at 23.00 penitents dressed in black tunics tied with rope, dragging chains behind them, many barefoot, take part in a Vía Crucis of austerity. Lights are turned off and the only illumination is provided by the moon and the bonfires in the streets.

The figure of Cristo de la Vida is carried through the streets in silence, the night broken only by the beat of a solitary drum and the shuffle of feet.

At midnight a so-called Procession in Silence is held, although in fact it is accompanied by constant rhythmic drumming, and the whole experience is a satisfyingly spiritual one as Jumilla relives the roots of its identity.

Now, in an effort to make the experience at least partly accessible to visitors all the year round, a new tourist route, the “Ruta de los Penitentes”, is being created in the old town with the help of 29,220 euros supplied by the regional government and under the auspices of the brotherhood of the Cristo de la Vida. Along the 1.5-kilometre route through the streets of old Jumilla there are to be 16 information panels (one every 100 metres or so, all in Spanish and English) and markers to signal the route on the ground every 40 metres as walkers follow the route taken every year by the procession, as well as a ceramic image to be installed in Calle Cabecico.

For further details contact the local tourist office (Plaza del Rollo, 1, telephone 968 780237 / 663 300779, email oficinaturismo@jumilla.org).

For more local events, news and visiting information go to the home page of Jumilla Today.