Going to Viana this week? The Romaria d'Agonia saves the Mordomia parade and the sea procession for Wednesday and Thursday
The last five days of Portugal's biggest romaria run from 19 to 23 August, with the Mordomia parade, flower carpets laid overnight in the Ribeira, and fireworks on four consecutive nights — the last of them over the river Lima.
The romaria opened on 15 August and has been saving itself. Almost everything people cross the country for is packed into the five days that are left, including fireworks on four consecutive nights, each one at midnight, each one somewhere different.
Wednesday 19: the Mordomia and the flower carpets
Reveille at 8.30am in Praça da República, giants and big-heads parading at noon, and at 4pm the Desfile da Mordomia — the images that travel the world, with the mordomas in full costume and the family gold worn at the chest. From 8pm the flower carpets start going down in the streets of the Ribeira. Go while they are being made, because the following afternoon a procession walks over them. Augusto Canário & Amigos play the Campo d’Agonia at 10pm.
Thursday 20: the sea procession and the first fireworks
This is the day the whole week points at. A walk through the Ribeira streets at 9am, solemn mass at 2.30pm, then the Procissão ao Mar, when the image of Our Lady is carried out to the boats. At midnight the Fogo da Santa goes up over the Campo d’Agonia.
The other three nights
Friday 21 has singers trading improvised verses at 5pm and closes with the Fogo Preso at the Jardim Marginal. Saturday 22 brings the historical and ethnographic procession at 4pm, brass bands facing off outside the church at 10.30pm, and the Fogo do Meio at midnight. Sunday 23 ends with the solemn procession at 4pm and the Serenata, fired over the river Lima, at midnight.
Practical notes
Everything on the street programme is free. The 24th crafts fair runs in the Jardim Público and, from the 19th, opens at noon and stays open until 1am. On firework nights the riverfront fills long before midnight, so plan to park well away and walk. If Viana is out of reach this week, Braga’s Noite Branca is the next big free night in the Minho.
Image: António Tedim / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
