On the Camino

I know that before I walked of the things that I wondered about was what the albergues were like so, in an occasional series like the craft one, I will go through a few and write what I can remember about each. This is the albergue in St Jean Pied du Port (if you want to know what the outside looks like then it's where Martin Sheen goes to see the policeman in the middle of the night in 'The Way'). Beds are assigned by the Pilgrim office and I think it was 5 euros which included a donated breakfast from the local confraternity. The showers were nice and hot and there is a kitchen but it's not for Pilgrims to use, just the hospiteleros.

    Some cats we saw on our second day walking last year just outside a shop we'd stopped at to get a drink - they were singularly unimpressed with the cookies we'd brought from home! They did let us give them a bit of a fuss though before they decided that we weren't really worth the effort.

I've walked to Finisterre just once (although I have visited another time as well) in 2010 in the Jubilee year. I'd walked the Camino Frances in 2009 and had wanted to carry on to Finisterre but an injury had not made it possible so I convinced my Dad to walk to Finisterre with me before he walked any of the Frances (my sister would do that the next week from Sarria with the two of us). The books say it takes four days and a lot of people do it in three but we took five - we had no walking on the Camino behind us to build upon after all and six days before my sister was to join us. It rained constantly for all five of those days, water streaming down the paths but then when my sister came and met us in Santiago the sun never seemed to go away. The rain didn't matter though because Dad's been back on the Camino twice more and will come with me and my sister on the Camino Portuguese later this year. Here are the sellos for the Camino Finisterre:

I was at school when I first heard about the Camino, somewhere around 12 years old. I was doing a school project on Pilgrimmages and we had studied the Pilgrimage to Mecca in class. To get some more information I interviewed Becky about her time in Taize and Mum told me about Stuart at Church who had walked to Santiago in Spain. I wasn't all that interested in finding out more, he was 60 or so and to me back then it seemed ancient, but I took along with he questions that I had asked Becky and did no more preparation than that, I knew nothing at all about the Camino and sat there listening to nightly rituals of washing clothes, seeing everyone sitting around and writing their diaries and miles walked each day. I heard about a route so few walked that Stuart needed a letter from our vicar saying that he was walking the route as a Christian and of reaching Santiago and having an individual interview with one if Santiago's priests that lasted nearly an hour as Stuart was questi...

A few more sellos - these are all from Triacastela onwards.

An earlier post of mine had pictures of everything that I took on the Camino (or rather everything that I could find to take pictures of!). Here's a bit of advice on packing for you. In general less is best; a lot of people take far too much and end up having to dump it or posting it forward to Santiago post office (who will then hold your items for 30 days ready for you to collect, many people have used this option and found that it works well for them but I have never myself done it). I was told before my first Camino to carry no more than 10% of your body weight which may work well for some people but as someone who weighs about 46 kilograms and is about 1m 55cm tall this is impractical – if you want to carry your own backpack all of the way then only carrying 4.6 kilograms is simply not possible. I carried a bag weighing 6-7.5 kilograms and found this to be a practical weight for me. I would say never carry more than 10 kilograms – you don’t need to and your Camino will not...

I was looking back over my diary for my first Camino (in 2009) and came across this list that I must have written after I had returned home about what I had learned whilst walking: The journey is more important then the destination Don’t make too many plans It’s good to share experiences If you don’t turn around and look back while you climb the mountain the you’ll miss the view It’s just as okay to receive as it is to give There can always be quiet times Some people have heavier loads than others Seven little things that I must try to remember still - these things can be easy to remember whilst still walking but can be difficult to remember when you return home so you have to remind yourself.