Alex Trelinski
OVER 500 Alicante Policia Local officers are being deployed on Thursday and into the weekend as the city celebrates its 534th Santa Faz pilgrimage.
The event traditionally takes place on the Thursday in the week after Easter and attracts around 200,000 pilgrims.
It’s the second biggest walk of its kind in the country, after the well-known Santiago de Compostela route in the north-west.
Participants start at Alicante’s San Nicolas cathedral from 8.00am onwards to walk the 7.5 kms route to the Santa Faz monastery.
The monastery houses a famous relic known as the Veil of Veronica which is a piece of cloth that Veronica used to wipe the face of Jesus Christ as he travelled with a cross to his crucifixion at Mount Calvary.
The Veil can only be seen in conjunction with the annual pilgrimage and is locked up for the rest of the year.
As many people do the walk instead on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, there is a party atmosphere for four days around Alicante with an array of stalls and entertainment laid on.
Besides controlling traffic and road closures on the pilgrimage route, the police using drones and beach quad bikes will be keeping an eye out for illegal outdoor alcohol parties involving young people known as botellons.
Alicante’s security councillor, Jose Ramon Gonzalez, said: “Police will seek to prevent such parties happening and will seize alcohol from minors and stop alcohol consumption on public roads and areas.”
He appealed to young people to ‘enjoy the pilgrimage without consuming alcohol because partying is not the same as alcohol’.
Special surveillance operations will take place on all of Alicante’s beaches to stop any botellons.
