Echternach has developed a strong tourism industry centred on the procession, which draws many thousands of tourists and pilgrims from around the world.

[2] The ritual[3] begins in the morning at the bridge over the River Sauer, with a sermon delivered by the parish priest (formerly by the abbot of the monastery).

Musicians play the Sprangprozessioùn, a centuries-old tune similar to an Irish jig or reel, based on the folk song "Adam had seven sons".

Pilgrims in rows of four or five abreast hold the ends of white handkerchiefs, and "dance" or "jump" from left to right and thus slowly move forward.

This aspect of the cultus of Saint Willibrord may be traced back almost to his death; among the stream of pilgrims to his tomb in the abbey church have been Emperors Charlemagne, Lothair I, Conrad, and later Maximilian (in 1512).

Documents of the fifteenth century already speak of it as a long-established custom, and that a similar "dancing" procession used to take place in the small town of Prüm, in the Eifel as early as 1342.

Since 1830, it has always taken place on Whit Tuesday, selected for reasons of tradition with no direct relation to Saint Willibrord himself, whose own feast day in the General Roman Calendar is 7 November.