Holy Year Numbers

[Covey]

As 2010 was a Holy Year on the Camino, the number of Pilgrims collecting their Compostella in Santiago was 272,511 for the whole year.

44% were female and 56% male.
87% arrived on foot and 12% by bike.

30% were under 30 years old
58% were aged 30 - 60
12% were over 60 (just over 34,000!)

55% stated they were doing it for religious reasons
The rest were Religious and Cultural, which meant they were hedging their bets!!

69% were Spanish
31% were from the Rest of the World.

25% started from Sarria
7% started from St Jean Pied du Port

70% walked the Camino Frances
12% the Camino Portugues
7% the Camino Norte
5% the Via de la Plata
3% the Camino Primitivo


2011 will be busy if only because quite a number of intending Pilgrims wanted to avoid the expected crowds in 2010, however, the crowds were only on the Sarria to Santiago stage and the numbers starting from St Jean were slightly lower than 2009.

2011 will see the nationality split reverse back to its normal 60/40 foreign/Spanish split.

[HuskyNerd]

Thanks for sharing these fascinating numbers, Covey. The 272,511 is the most impressive of all. It's amazing that over a quarter million pilgrims walked or bike a camino in 2010. Wow.