Camino de Santiago

For 1200 years Christians have been walking across Europe to Santiago de Compostela in the Galician mountains of northwestern Spain to pay homage to the resting place of the apostle Saint James the Greater. Now not only Christian pilgrims but other walkers wanting to renew themselves on one or another lever or just to enjoy a long walk down the back roads of Spain walk this same path to Santiago and beyond to the Atlantic at Finisterra. Some years back the UN declared it an International Heritage Trail.

There are many reasons, and combinations of reasons, to walk the Camino. Here are just a few.

• Walking the Camino de Santiago is a spiritual journey into yourself and the universe. The journey along the Camino de Santiago is life changing. No one returns the same.
• You got a call from the Universe, from God, and you know you have to go.
• If you do not know where to go next in your life, walking the Camino is a good place to search your inner self for answers. With its space and time, the Camino gives you the chance to go deeply into your spirit, heart, emotions, and mind to find answers to your questions, even to questions you do not know you have.
• As a Christian pilgrim, you walk to the third most revered destination in the Christian world—the tomb of St. James the Greater, the brother and apostle of Jesus.
• Christian pilgrims also walk to receive full remission of their sins for walking to the grave of St. James.
• As an epic walk, the Camino gives you some 465 miles (737 kilometers) to walk, more than enough to walk through transforming walls several times. You walk through life a step at a time.
• You may have seen the four people in the movie, The Way, each experiencing deep spiritual and emotional awakenings as they walked the Camino. You can do the same.

In 2003 I walked the Camino de Santiago from the Pyrenees to the Atlantic in Finisterra. I met my wife-to-be there. A second time my wife-to-be and I drove and walked her route from Zurich, Switzerland to Finisterra. Then in 2004 we retraced our steps walking back from Santiago toward Germany. We didn't walk all that distance but we did 500 kilometers (300 miles) of it.

As part of our Pilgrimage from California to Jerusalem we walked the Camino from Lisbon, Portugal to Santiago and Finisterra. That finished one of our goals to walk from our front door in the U.S. to Santiago. I then walked east from Santiago once again along the Camino Frances.

Before and during the first walk I posted several pages here on Works and Words linked to my Spain 2003 page. Many of these were rough renditions when I put them there on the fly. But I have now updated them and added more pictures including large versions for most of the original small versions.