Rob Horgan
EXTRAORDINARY flash floods across Andalucia are threatening one of the region’s cultural cornerstones.
The 18km annual midnight pilgrimage through Albox, Almeria, to the monastery in Salient is in jeopardy.
Bulldozers are currently trying to clear up the mess after flash floods hit the area this morning and this afternoon, causing at least one death.
“It is the worst floods I’ve seen in a few years now,” expat councillor in Albox, Maura Hillen told the Olive Press.
“When it rains here, it comes down fast.
“There are teams currently trying to clear up so the pilgrimage can take place, but if there is any more rain then I imagine it will have to be cancelled, which would of course be a great shame.”
When I visited Almeria in the Spring of 68 with a friend looking to work on the film ‘Patton Lust for Glory’ we were told ” it never Rains in Almeria”. However on the last day before heading north to Pamplona via Madrid it did.
In those days Almeria did’nt really have a proper sewage system at all and I well remember my travelling companion Brian negotiating a path through the dessicated faeces ‘bobbling’ along down the centre gully of the street and misjudging his route and slipping on one and shouting “it never rains in f~#>ing Almeria”. It’s just as well the Almerian who told us this was’nt around at the time, only later on did he find the experience funny.