All Saints Day in Spain

Today it is All Saints Day, and here in Spain, it is a national holiday. It is a day for remembering loved ones who have died, and it is traditionally celebrated with a big clean up of the cemetery. There is a cemetery on the edge of each village, where the graves are stacked in rows above ground; not buried. Today families go to their family graves and clean them. Then they add lots of fresh flowers. Some people take big displays, previously ordered from flower shops, and others take posies from their garden. When we drove past our village cemetery on our way to our choir practice this morning, we could hardly squeeze our car through the rows of parked cars. There were three florists with stalls set up on the road side and they were doing a brisk trade. This afternoon there was just one left by the gate, but there were still plenty of families arriving to tend to their area. It looked beautiful with each grave overflowing with white lilies, red roses and lots more. My photo doesn't do it justice but it was all in shadow, and I felt it was not the right occasion to wave a camera around for too long. It is quite usual for families to take a picnic with them and stay all day. We popped back up there tonight because we had been told that it was all lit up with candles for tonight, and so it was. It was very beautiful. It seems to me it is a very good tradition that ensures family members are reverently remembered, and the cemetery is kept in a good condition.