The long procession to commemorate the vow begins in the small church of Sant'Efis in the Stampace neighbourhood of Cagliari and arrives at the Romanesque church in Nora, where the saint was beheaded in 303 AC under the Emperor Diocletian. 

On the 65 km walk, the statue is carried inside a sumptuous Baroque-style coach, on a cart drawn by beautiful oxen bred only for this purpose. These richly decorated carts, called 'traccas' in the Sardinian language, display multi-coloured fabrics, embroideries and flowers on the yokes and even the oxen’s horns. All participants in the procession are dressed in the traditional dress of their villages.

The sound of the launeddas, an ancient three-pipe musical instrument, accompanies the whole route. On May 1^st, around 11pm, the procession makes its first stop in Sarroch, where the statue spends the night inside the parish church of Santa Vittoria, while the oxen and coach find shelter in the courtyard of Casa Mascia, an old manor house. In a will dated 20 December 1886, the head of the Mascia family invited his heirs to keep his vow and continue to host the saint's coach.

The saint's first stop in Sarroch, however, is the Cappella della Vergine del Carmelo in Villa d'Orri, located in the grounds of the ancient villa of the Manca di Villahermosa family.