1 year in ronda

A well-kept secret can now be revealed – Spain can be cold in winter!

Ronda is a mountain town – more than 2,000 feet above sea-level – so January can be cold. The big event is “Reyes” (the festival of the kings) which we sometimes call the Epiphany in English. It’s bigger than Christmas here. In fact, it is Christmas. The 6 of January is when Spanish children get their presents.

Ronda has a pasacalles – a parade through the streets. The Three Wise Men are the stars of the parade, and everyone turns out to watch the floats go by. Bring an umbrella. It might rain, though it pro- bably won’t. The real danger from which the umbrella will protect you is the sweets (candy). People on the floats throw a constant shower of sweets to the bystanders. The pasacalles ends at about 8pm, and everyone goes for a beer and a tapa.

There are three bank holidays in January: the first of the month is, of course, New Year’s Day, and the sixth is “Reyes”. Day 24 is a local festival specific to Ronda.

The February big deal is “Carnaval”. Its roots lie in religious celebrations, but it is now an entirely secular party. Lent is not important in Protestant countries, but in the Catholic South, it matters. Many of us are aware that Brazil and the Caribbean go crazy for Carnaval, but it’s enjoyed widely – and each region adds its own characteristics.

Before refrigerators and freezers and cans and packets, food was very perishable. Lent (the six-week build-up to Easter) used to require people to restrict their diets, out of respect for Jesus Christ, who fasted during this period. Imagine Mom, a hundred years ago, with milk, butter and eggs which will rot if not consumed. She organised a pancake party, to use the stuff up.

Cádiz, on Spain’s Atlantic coast, has a strong tradition of laughing at the rich and famous. Local people developed a custom of singing scurrilous (and very funny) songs, lambasting the upper class. Singers wore disguise, to avoid retaliation. These minstrels are known as “chirigotas”. Ordinary young men start meeting in September to write and learn their funny songs. Each team of four or five decides on a themed costume, and when Carnaval arrives, they take to the streets.

Go to a bar and have a drink. A bunch of chirigotas will show up, and entertain you for an hour. It’s all free!

The date of Carnaval varies, but 28 February is fixed as “Andalucía Day”.

Holy Week (“semana santa”) is one of the highlights of the year. This account will be spread over March and April.

Easter being a movable feast, the dates of semana santa vary from year to year. The next five holy weeks will fall on the following dates.
2026   29 March - 5 April
2027   21 March - 28 March
2028   9 April - 16 April
2029   25 March - 1 April
2030   14 April – 21 April

All over Spain (but with far greater intensity in the South) semana santa is a wonderful street drama. And Ronda is the perfect size for anyone who wants to witness this festival. Seville is overwhelming (the streets are crowded and four or five processions might be happening simultaneously) and a small village like Parauta lacks the population and resources to put on a great show.

Ronda offers you two processions a day – afternoon and evening. In the Middle Ages, church people wanted to educate the illiterate masses and put across the meaning of Christ’s Passion. It’s a great story. Jesus, being both God and man, knows that he has to die, and dreads what’s coming. The Catholic religion embraces colour and drama, and in quite a few countries citizens acted out the last week of Christ’s life in a series of tableaux. Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a donkey, and the crowds welcome him. One of his men, Judas, does a secret deal with Jesus’ enemies to get Christ into a place where he can be arrested. After a final supper with his disciples, Jesus is lured into an olive grove, and captured. His trial is not fair – he is tortured beforehand, and gets no chance to explain himself. He is condemned to die on the cross. There is a strong theme of accepting suffering in the Catholic religion – it used to be called, “mortifying the flesh”. The idea is, if you undergo pain and discomfort in this life, you will get less punishment after death. Volunteers known as “costaleros” carry floats through the streets. The floats are extremely heavy, and each procession can last up to five hours. The costaleros do it to show repentance for their sins or to ‘help’ a dead family member by offering up the hardship to God in that person’s name.

The floats are heavy because a lot of people have worked on them for many hours to make them as beautiful as possible. Onto a basic wooden frame are added a “snapshot” of Christ’s Passion – an episode from the biblical story – acted out by lifesize wooden figures. This scene is embellished with thousands of flowers, silver candlesticks and other embellishments like a living palm tree!

May is a very busy month in Ronda. First of all, there is the “101 Kilo- metres” race. The spearhead unit of the Spanish army, “La Legión”, has a big base on the edge of town. Back in the 1990s La Legión organised the first race, encouraging the youth of Andalucía to take up healthy hobbies and to reject drugs. It was an instant success, and has taken place every year since. Participants can walk, run or cycle the 63-mile course. People flock to Ronda from all over Europe for the race weekend. Next, there is “Ronda Romántica”, a unique festival. The Romantic era (roughly 1780-1830) was special for our city. With its natural fortress-like defences and its proximity to Africa, Ronda was the ideal place for a smuggling industry to thrive. This, together with the fierce independence of the people, made the city the bandit capital of Europe. For four days in May, rondeños dress up in period costume and party in the street. And then there is the “romería”. An ancient religious procession, probably older than Christianity, inspired people to process out of town and into the countryside, to visit a holy well or a cave shrine. It lost its religious trappings centuries ago, and now it is an excuse to wear fine clothes, sing flamenco songs and enjoy a protracted picnic in the campo (fields). As with many places in Europe, Ronda celebrates a bank holiday on 1 May (the day of the workers).

The months of June and July are quiet times for the people of Ronda. It’s too hot for doing anything energetic, and a lot of businesses (and all the schools) shut down, and everyone goes to the beach. The Mediterranean is only 40 minutes away, but Ronda people tend to shun the southern coast (they say the water’s dirty, and there are plagues of jellyfish). The Atlantic is further away, but the beaches are deserted, and undeveloped, and the sea is refreshingly cold (and the waves are big!)

Back in Ronda, you might want to catch the Breeders’ Fair. This ancient festival has declined in recent years, but is still a good place to enjoy a beer and watch some fine horses performing Spanish dressage.

Ronda and the surrounding villages hold some interesting events in August. The International Folk Dance Gala brings groups from Mexico, Israel, Brazil and many other to the “dreamed-of city” to perform. Then there is a big flamenco night, when some of the Spanish stars come to Ronda to sing (and dance) in the open air. Montejaque, a village ten miles from Ronda, goes crazy in August, with a whole month of rolling festivals. Everyone is welcome! One of the biggest religious feasts of the year, the Assumption, closes all the banks and shops for a couple of days, mid- month.

Without a doubt, the climax of Ronda’s year falls in the first week of September. This is the “Feria”, the city fair. Four or five days of round-the- clock eating, drinking and dancing are sure to tempt you up to the “recinto ferial”, to explore the casetas. A caseta is a hospitality tent, and you needn’t feel shy about entering and having fun. You will be made to feel welcome. They all have live music, and the girls look magnificent in their flamenco dresses.

October is a quiet month in Ronda (after the Feria, no-one’s got any money). One event that’s worth knowing about is the bank holiday on the 12th, “The Day of Spanishness”. The Legión might march through town, and there’s lots of flag-kissing (and, of course, eating and drinking).

1 November is a bank holiday, the “day of the dead”, which in fact is quite a pleasant event, and not at all gloomy. People go to the cemetery to tidy up grandma’s grave and place fresh flowers. Being rondeños, they chat and laugh all morning. Some people want a permanent memorial to the 15 locals who lost their lives in 1917, when a landslide engulfed them. It’s known as the “Tragedy of the Tajo” (Tajo being the Ronda term for the city’s spectacular gorge). You may have heard or read the Hemingway canard of the 500 rondeños who were thrown to their deaths in the Tajo by Franco’s troops. It never happened.

The people of Ronda like to make a ‘puente’ (a bridge). If a public holiday falls on a Thursday, for example, they feel entitled to take Friday off work, in order to make a ‘bridge’ to the weekend. Traditionally, the days 6 and 8 of December are “Christmas shopping” bank holidays, and this gives rondeños endless bridge possibilities. In 2025, the two shopping days fall on Saturday and Monday, so don’t expect to find anything open on the Friday or the Tuesday. Christmas is celebrated, but it’s not a big deal. Rondeños prefer Christmas Eve, which they call the ‘noche buena’.

Keep your eyes peeled for the zambomba, a percussion instrument which looks like a drum, but is pierced by a stick. The stick is manipulated to make the drumskin vibrate – the authentic Christmas sound of Ronda. Better still, look for a Christmas concert (also called a zambomba). In the street, it will be accompanied by fire braziers and roasted chestnuts.