Firstly my aplogies to everyone who received the newsletter today – I CC’ed all instead of BCC. I will be more careful in the future and I hope it causes no problems for anyone.
I’m writing this with the thought, “what would I be doing now if I was heading on the Camino next month?”
Well honestly if it was me, and it has been, I would be doing nothing apart from booking my flights. I have never managed in my life to get these €0.99 flights. I am not well enough organized, I always end up paying more…
So at this point make sure your flights are booked, if you need any connections by bus or train try and get them organized also. These I see as the bookends, all the time in the middle is for walking and letting go of my normal world, sinking into something quite different for a while.
Boots or walking shoes. If you are not already using the ones that you will be walking in – start. If you are buying new walking boots or shoes get them now and start using them. Along the same lines get out walking a bit, it does not have to be a great deal. This was one thing that I had in my favour before walking the Camino the first time – I was used to walking a little in the Dublin mountains at weekends, though I did not ever try it with my rucksack – and I don’t know if I would tell others to.
There is a list of Albergues – Refugio on my site http://www.caminodesantiago.me.uk/albergues.html it may be of some help. Also if you find any mistakes while on your way I would appreciate if you can let me know, it has been updated by other pilgrims and from those that run some of the hostels.
There is a packing list on the site http://www.caminodesantiago.me.uk/packing.html admittedly my packing is extremely frugal. Anna tells me that her list would include a lot more, however this was what I took the second time, the first I had to dump much of the things that I had taken – I ended up with too much weight on my back and that was bad for my knees and feet.
I have added a new flight booking engine to the travel page – if you find it useful please let me know and I will leave it there – and the opposite, thanks.
I have been asked a lot about walking through the cities. The only place I got a little lost was
One Left.
This last part is a promotion for a CD that I received in the post. The CD was inspired by the singer’s Camino. It is very good – to my surprise. Why surprise, well I have a very cynical head sometimes – and that always jumps in when I hear that someone was inspired by something like the Camino – yeah poor me… However it has been played at least once every day since the day I got it last week. This is their web site http://www.oneleft.com/index.htm and you can hear some of it on their site, it is brill. I will write more about it later this week on my Camino blog.
One last thing – I heard last night about someone in
Buen Camino
Leslie Gilmour
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I will be walking the segment between Estella-Rabanal del Camino to raise money for Episcopal Relief and Development’s Inspiration Fund that addresses Millennium Development Goal #6, eradication of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases. If you go to my blog, inspirationpilgrimage.blogspot.com, you will find a link that will take you to ERD and instructions on how to donate. This last 272-mile segment will complete three of our walking from Le Puy, France-Santiago, 1570kms.
I like the list albergue! This is to me most useful. I wish to have had this before. I now will print it!
Glad you found it useful, print away that is what it is for.
Hi Leslie,
I’m a bit new to this, but for reasons I can’t explain I feel I have to do the camino and am planning it now for next year, it will be my 40th I promised myelf I would do it before in my 40th year. I’ve read your site cover to cover it’s fab, my husband is from Donegal and we have spent alot of time there. Anyway I digress, I have 2 concerns, Firstly I’m not mad into exercise and everyone thinks it hilarious that I’m doing this, since people rarely see me out of stillettos. WIll I be able to do it, I don’t want to start it and end up coming home early I would never live it down. The other thing is saftey. I’m doing it on my own and the thought of several weeks walking the streets in some foreign clime has my family and me a biy -rather nervous. am I being a wimp or should I be packing pepper spray, don’t them finding my remains in a ruck sack.
Hi Amanda, Walking everyday with a backpack can be quite a lot if you have not done any walking before. It is worth doing some before going. As for walking on your own, well many people do and lots of women. There are very few reports of any problems and I would imagine that there are fewer problems there than living in any city in Ireland. It is quite safe.