Wanderers in Wonder

“When the swallows come back to Capistrano,

That’s the day you promised to come back to me,

When you whispered, ‘Farewell’, in Capistrano,

Twas the day the swallow flew out to sea”.

                         Leon Rene

Big hit for the Ink Spots in 1940 and Pat Boone, Glen Miller, Guy Lombardo and Elvis over the years.

San Juan de Capistrano, a mission founded in 1776 by Padre Junipero Serra. San Juan de Capistrano would come to be called the ‘Jewel of California Missions’. The mission fell into a state of disrepair in the mid 1800’s. It became part of a large ranch and was allowed to decay. But, the decaying mission became home to swallows which migrated from Brazil to San Juan. Legend has it that the swallows always returned on the Feast Day of St. Joseph, 19 March.

The only chapel/church still standing and in use where Padre Junipera Serra said mass.

La Trinidad..

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As the mission restoration began in the early 1900’s fewer and fewer swallows returned to the Mission. They still return to the area, but gravitate to a less popular place to roost, underneath road bridges.

The town of San Juan de Capistrano still holds a celebration of the swallows, ‘La Fiesta de las Golondrinas’, every year in mid-March.

Peace…Wanderers in Wonder.