About 200,000 people attend Holy Week in Antigua. The town has a population of 35,000.
Yesterday, Good Friday, was the final procession. It started at 4:00 am and was still, incredibly slowly, parting vast crowds at midnight.
Claudia tells me that Jesus died at 3:00 pm so instead of the purple gowns the anda bearers wore, and the purple awnings hanging from the buildings, everything somehow, somewhere, changed to black. It’s very likely, but I don’t know, that there was a massive change over of the people involved, although logistically if this was the case it must have been a challenge.
There were two andas, the first for Jesus and the second for his Mom, as Claudia put it, which somehow came across strongly but unsurprisingly.
By luck we found ourselves almost at the front of the crowd in Parque Central after dark. We waited for a hour or two, listening to the beating of drums in the distance.
Hundreds of black hooded men and black veiled women respectively protected and bore the weight of Jesus and Mary’s andas.
Apologies for the poor photo’s.
Waiting
Hooded men first
Swinging large burners of scented charcoal
And
The first, Jesus’s, anda
It rounded a corner of the Parque in front of us. Occasionally it stops.
Then, about fifteen minutes later, Mary’s
The day crowd and the volcano
Ride update:
The bike parts missed the flight two Fridays ago, then, when they finally got on the plane they got stuck here in Guatemala waiting for commerce to resume after Holy Week. There should be a significant update on Tuesday night. Meanwhile, ready to go as usual and trying hard to stay relaxed.