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Yesterday we had Palm Sunday.
Palms.
Quick stop in Vilafranca de Bonany.
A town along the road from Manacor to Palma.
You always see this Jesus guy of the church tower when
driving along the ring road around the town.
Finally I made it to the town.
What did I expect? Corona has shut everything down anyway.
Nothing, I tell you nothing is going on.
A couple of coffee houses open.
And then I read in internet that this town is famous for ...
... watermelons!!!
"Festa i Fira del Meló"
Due to known reasons the last melon feast was celebrated 2019.
Vilafranca de Bonany was founded in 1620 at the foot of the Puig de Bonany
mountain by the baron Pau Sureda de Sant Martí. Needing labourers to
work on the land, he declared the area exempt from royal taxes.
The name 'Vilafranca' means 'Villa without taxes'.
The only information I found (without spending many hours)
oabout this Lluis de Vilafranca is in Catalan language:
El seu nom abans d’ingressar a l’orde caputxí (1788) era Joan Mestre i Oliver.
Durant molts anys fou zelós bibliotecari del convent de Palma,
del qual era guardià quan patí l’exclaustració (1835).
So he was a librarian.
These guys are shown in front of the entrance of the church.
Feel free to such for further info.
The current church of Santa Bárbara, which is their patron saint and
celebrated on 4th December, was built in the early 18th century and
extended in the mid-20th century. The sculpture of the Sacred Heart
on top of the dome was installed in 1942 and is the work of
Manacor-born Miquel Vadell.
In this posting I just want to show that Mallorca has so
many options, so many beautiful things to detect,
to make nice photographs (the light is soooo good on the island),
to inspire people to read more about history.
Mallorca is much more than a party hot spot.
