Cabrejas

I want to tell the reader what is my favorite place and one of its more important tradition. The name of this place is Cabrejas del Pinar, my village. It is located in Cabrejas mountain range. If you want to find it, it is in Burgos road about 37 km from Soria. Cabrejas has a population of around 480 inhabitants. It is one of the biggest villages of the province with 5,000 hectares of pine grove. It has lots if beautiful and important buildings such as; the castle on the top of the village, the Saint Millan church in the center, the Blanca hermitage 3km far from the village, the Ann hermitage where the old cementery is located and in addition you could visit a roman fountain. In fact the Blanca hermitage is used in weddings and during its party and it is a wonderful church surrounded by trees and almost in the middle of the forest. Saint Millan church where masses are celebrated during the whole year.

This village is famous for its mushrooms like the Boletus Edulis or the “Nicalo” and its truffles. Both products could be bought in a local enterprise. In its forest you can also hunt a great variety of animals or just enjoy a good day in the nature. I love my village with its summers in the swimming pool, having lunch in the forest cooking the food using fire, playing football with my friends and enjoying its traditions. I also want to talk about one of its traditions. This tradition is famous in the surroundings villages.

What is the first thing that comes into my mind when I say lots of people, a place to eat in the forest and two hundred kilos of mussels? You could imagine a lot of strange or impossible parties. Even these three things couldn’t let imagination to express easily.

The celebration I am going to talk about is called “The Mussel” in Spanish “el Mejillon”. Every year we celebrate this party. It consists of making everyone of the village help with this event. It is celebrated at the end of August and it stars on Thursday. Its duration is for only 3 intense days. Villagers organize lots of competitions such as football, swimming or “fronton” where you need to pay some money for the registration. At the same time they sell a kind of lottery for winning a sheep and with the money they obtain from the lottery and from the competitions, they pay the bills for the mussels, everything needed in for cooking or whatever and for the music groups. On Friday afternoon everyone cleans the mussels in the fountain; young children, adults and granddads help with this task. On Saturday everyone goes to the pine forest where there is a place prepared called “el Cubillo” for having lunch and also dinner. Some people is responsible for cooking all the mussels with a great tomatoes sauce, others prepared old games so everyone could played after having lunch and there is a brass band to entertain the assistants. At the end of the day some people stay and have dinner and finally everyone return walking to the village. At night there is a music band in the square and adults go there for dancing. This tradition is repeated over the years with a great affluent of people from all Soria.

The fact of celebrating it in the nature and with the collaboration of the entire village is great. This is my view of my favorite place and if you like it you must come and visit it. I promise you will never forget it!