enough space in July

[vindikas]

I will be walking Camino in July-August with my 2 daughters. A friend just returned from Camino and mentioned that they had to start walking around 5:00 to get to next place by 1:00PM so they would have place to sleep. I do not have any intentions to start walking that early on a daily bases. Should I be concerned about the possibility to end up with no place to sleep?

[Covey]

The daily start and finish times are really a product of personal choice rather than necessity.

In July/August it gets hot (usually) in the mid to late afternoon, so a number of people plan on starting at 5am. They are heartily detested by most walkers as they crash around the albergue with head torches in full searchlight mode getting ready, and wake up everyone else. Some get up at 5am and are still crashing around at 0730 getting ready because they are so disorganized. You only have 7kgs of kit to look after, and the camino is not exactly a fashion parade, so it should take no longer than 30 minutes to get up, roll up your sleeping bag, wash and brush your teeth, and hit the trail looking for some coffee or hot chocolate!!

If you walk at a "normal" speed, stop for the odd coffee or drink and something to eat, there is no need to leave before 0730, which means getting up at 7am. You will have covered 25kms by 2pm which is a good time to stop before the afternoon heat, find a bed for the night, and sit back and wait for the 0500hrs walkers to arrive.

It is one of the mysteries of the Camino what they actually do during the day!!

If you start walking at first light (0730) and aim to stop at 2pm, you will rarely have any difficulty in finding somewhere to sleep. The ever growing number of private albergues (modern plumbing and hot water!!) have taken the pressure off the official albergues.

[Pavel]

As a whole-day walker, in the last week of my journey I had trouble to find beds in municipal albergues in bigger towns (not in private albergues - but 8 to 10 euro is more than 3 in official ones), but not in villages. Sounds strange, but smaller albergue usually means more empty beds
At two o'clock, even official albergues still should have some emty room.

[Judy vd Meulen]

Another "danger" about heading out in the dark to walk the Camino too early in the mornings, is the real possibility of a stumble. Walking with a headlight can be tricky. I recall meeting a lady from Eastern Canada who had stumbled and fallen in an early morning departure and the bruises on her face were pretty amazing. Our group did the "safe" thing and reserved at private albergues the night before but that did mean a certain inflexibility as to how far you walked.

[Covey]

The other big danger is missing an arrow showing the way in the dark!!

The Camino Frances is well marked by yellow arrows painted on the road, or the side of a building, or on a post, or in fact, just about anywhere.

If you miss an arrow in the dark, then you can end up lost and that can cost you hours trying to backtrack in the dark where there are no arrows to see.