Pilgrimage V Tourism

I have written on this blog before that when you reach Santiago you stop being a Pilgrim and start being a tourist but what is the difference between the two?

I remember reading in an albergue somewhere that, ‘The tourist demands, the pilgrim accepts’. It is true that I do not count my pilgrimages to Santiago as a holiday in the usual sense but I do do ‘touristy’ things. Some of these are Pilgrim things such as visiting Leon Cathedral but others cannot be seen as Pilgrim activities (for example going to the Roman museum in Astorga).

A tourist though only goes to a place to see the sights, a person who travels or visits a place for pleasure whereas a pilgrim, although they will see the sights whilst they are there, is moving toward a destination (be it Santiago, Rome or elsewhere).

Possibly a pilgrim becomes more immersed in the culture they are in as well, or at least in the culture of the trail, than a tourist will as albergues are usually in the middle of the town and hotels are sometimes in areas that become almost tourist enclaves.

Having walked the Camino, Pilgrims Way and non pilgrimage routes in the Hadrian’s Wall path and the Coast to Coast route I do think that I felt differently on each although I cannot define how. Maybe it had more to do with the people I met on pilgrimage, the welcome that is received by the Pilgrim on The Way from other walkers as well as the local people was more open and friendly than on the other routes as well as the knowledge that the pilgrimage routes I am walking because of my faith and not as a ends in itself.

Is it therefore the attitude of yourself as a pilgrim and those around you which defines if you are a pilgrim or a tourist or is it something else I have not thought of here, let me know your thoughts.

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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 t

On the Camino

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