This Year's Camino

I'm not many days away from setting off on this year's Camino and it's going to be a bit unusual. Me and Becky are walking from Astorga which we have done twice before however, once we get to tricastella we are meeting up with Mum and Dad.

Dad has walked several Caminos with us but this will be mum's first, her bad back's meant that we thought she'd never be able to come with us but she's done a lot of work and is coming this year.

Tricastella to Santiago will be 'slackpacking' as mum is going to have most of her stuff carried and will be staying in private rooms. The rest of us will be carrying own bags and staying in albergues but whilst the first part of our Camino we will walk 130 km in 5 days we will be covering 144 km in 10 days usually walking about 12km a day - a lot slower than I have walked before. A part of me is very interested in seeing what the Camino is like at this speed and what, if any, difference I will see in the Camino and perhaps myself as I go.

I am not sure how much I wil blog on this Camino - I really do enjoy this blog but don't want it to become the 'aim' of my Camino so I think I'm going to see how it goes and how I feel (and when I have wifi and if my 'phone battery holds out!). If I don't blog a lot whilst on the Camino I will do a write up of each day when I get back.

I have some of my 'Don't STOP Walking' badges ready for this Camino so if you see me then do ask for one!

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The Camino Primitivo

The Camino Primitivo (or the Original Way) is reportedly the very first Camino Way to Santiago in the 9 th century when most of Spain was under the control of the Moors and it runs from near the city of Ovideo in Asturias as it starts in Villavicosa (which also lies on the Camino Norte so many people follow this Way from Basque city of San Sebastian (Donosti in Basque) or in from the French border at Irun ( this route then hugs the Bay of Biscay passing through Guernica, Bilbao, Santander, Llanes before going under the Picos de Europa and then heads along the coast to Ovideo) before branching off onto the Primitivo which goes across the mountains and through the city of Lugo before joining the Frances at Melide. The route is 320km long. Image taken from https://viaalpina2013.wordpress.com/2013/04/14/camino-del-norte-camino-primitivo/

Symbols of the three main Christian Pilgrimages

The symbol of the Pilgrim to Santiago is the Scallop shell of which many can be found on the coast of Galicia and it is actually a symbol of the Pilgrimage (and has become a symbol of other Christian Pilgrimages too) partly because you could find the shell easily there and so could go back home and show it off as proof that you had done the Pilgrimage. It has also been included in carvings in some Churches.

Pilgrims' Trail to Saint Michels Mont, France

I have only walked two of the Camino routes (the Frances and Portuguese) and still want to try many of the others and yet I am also finding other Pilgrimage routes that I want to walk - I did the Pilgrims' Way in the summer which starts from Winchester which is also the starting point for the Pilgrims' Trail a 155 mile route that finishes at Mont St Michel in Normandy, France. The cult of saint Michel was popular in Britain from the 9th century and the Pilgrims walking this way were called Miquelots and many Pilgrims on their way to Santiago. The route is marked by green way markers in Hampshire taking walkers from Winchester to Bishop's Waltham to Southwick and then to Portsmouth where ferries are caught to France and Way markers become blue. Tradition says that, in 709 Saint Michael the Archangel appeared to the bishop of Avranches, Saint Aubert, and told him to build a chapel in his honour on the island. The bishop obeyed and soon sent a group of monks over...

On the Camino

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