El RocÃo is approaching with all its traditions, among others, the crossing of the sprays of Quema, where more than 60 brotherhoods with their horses and carts pass each year and declared a Festival of Tourist Interest in Andalusia. But this year with the drought, this iconic moment when the horses drink, the pilgrims cool off and the faithful are baptized, could be an impossibility.
To try to find a solution, the Government Delegation has requested the Guadalquivir Hydrographic Confederation (CHG) to study “combining” the discharge of the Agrio river with the passage of sprays through the Vado de Quema, a measure that would be done taking advantage of the “ordinary unloading” planned for the farmers of the region, making that date coincide with the pilgrimage, since more than 60 brotherhoods that make a pilgrimage to the Almonte village use this path on their outward journey.
The state body is studying this option “but not before listening to the irrigators”, so that the CHG is holding meetings with the farmers “in case we can benefit everyone at the same time”, say sources from the Confederation, who They emphasize that, “in no case would it be a specific discharge due to the passage of the sprinklers, but rather the water from the Agrio (which is at 70% of its capacity) has to go through there”.
The request of the Government Delegation seeks that the channel, completely dry, carry water so that the animals can drink and facilitate, in turn, the passage of pilgrims in an enclave that makes up one of the traditional images of the pilgrimage and that It concentrates a large public that meets there to see the flow of the brotherhoods.
El Vado de Quema, in the municipality of Aznalcázar, has also been affected by the drought that is plaguing the Andalusian countryside. This ‘Sevillian Jordan’ is used every year by pilgrims for their Rociero ‘baptism’ and as the simpecados pass through this point, declared a Festival of Tourist Interest in Andalusia, prayers and songs to the Virgin follow one another.
The passage of Brotherhoods through the Vado de Quema, through which more than 60 brotherhoods pass on the way out (less on the way back because those that come from eastern Andalusia do not make the return) has its origin in the first pilgrimages of devotees to the village of El RocÃo, when the brotherhoods had not even been established as such.
The high point is when the Simpecado wagon of each brotherhood passes by, which is traditionally pulled by a team of oxen and accompanied by pilgrims both on foot and on horseback. This is how one of the most iconic images of each year of this massive pilgrimage is produced.
When the Simpecado wagon is in the water, there are prayers and songs and, in some cases, the baptism as pilgrims of those who walk the path for the first time. At this moment, the feeling and participation extends to all those present.
Now the Guadalquivir Hydrographic Confederation is studying the possibility of delivering the water, which in any case has to be unloaded for the irrigators, so that this image, which has gone around the world hundreds of times, can be produced again.