Virgen de la Peña, Mijas

When we woke up this morning, we discovered that the skies were more than overcast. A layer of fog had rolled in off the sea, engulfing the foreshore and land behind including our urbanzacion, forty metres above sea level. This unusual phenomenon I remember from my stay at Nerja this time last year. We had no idea how long it would last, but decided we'd head inland, uphill for a change, so we took the road up to Mijas Pueblo, and very soon found ourselves above the cloud.

We wandered around the village, with Clare doing what she loves doing most on holiday, buying birthday and Christmas gifts for friends and relatives and then enjoying a tapas lunch in a bar near the parish church. A group of men were out and about, getting the trona de la Virgen de la Peña out of storage from the specially constructed annexe at the east end of the church where occasional equipment is stored, and preparing it for the upcoming period of processional activities. 

Today is the day the church commemorates the beheading of St John the Baptist, quite topical in view of recent terrorist outrages in the Middle East. This day is the beginning of a none day vigil of prayer, a novena, in honour of the birth of the Virgin Mary on 8th September. There will be celebrations and processions with the image of the town's patronesss, our Lady of the Rocks/Peaks (in Italian, la Madonna della Rocca, as I recall from Sicily in December 2012). The village has a sanctuary in a hillside cave, dedicated to our Lady of the Rocks on a promontory overlooking the sea plain.

After lunch, Clare wanted to do some more shopping. I set off on foot to climb up through the back streets, across the by-pass road, and up a rough mountain track to find the Ermita del Calvario that sits on the hillside overlooking the town. Walking the way of the Cross starts in a steep back street, near a casa cofradia where lay people devoted to organising devotions along the Way of the Cross assemble. The rough uphill path is marked by simple numbered cairns. The way is scented by the aromatic pines which grow there, an aroma reminiscent of liturgical incense, and there's a white washed chapel at the end of the journey, floodlit and visible for miles at night, with a stone forecourt where devotees can gather in prayer, looking out over their village and the valley below.  

It's like the Via Crucis in Taormina, with its superb view from on high, but is also a contrast, with its steps, street lighting and set of modern metallic sculptures symbolising the Stations of the Cross, constructed along the line of an ancient footpath up to a Saracen fortress. These high places may not be the easiest places to make a home or a living, but they remain places of inspiration, part of popular devotion, valued meeting places for the community when it isn't earning a living. Always well worth the climb.