The Botafumerio!

So I woke up on Sunday and had a feeling that I would see the two American sisters at church. I hadn´t seen them since Portomarin a few days earlier but figured that they were due about now. I went in early so I could get a seat and was amazed to see they had the Botafumerio on display. This is the largest cencer in the world. It weighs 80kg and is made of pure silver. It requires about 8 people just to swing it and it hangs from the ceiling and swings from one transcept to the other. The reason it´s not out so often is because it costs about €400 in incence each time it´s used! Traditionally, it is thought, that it was used to rid the church of the smell that accompanied all the pilgrims and beggers on ye ol´ days. (Not like us ´hygenic´ pilgrims these days!) If you look on YouTube on this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Zp7F2VIvj0 and FFwd to 3:55 you can see it in action! Those with slower connections can read about it here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botafumeiro

For those back home I got a video of it myself but I was in one of the transcept so it was flying over my head. Very awesome!