Roughly 60% of all pilgrims travel on the Camino Frances.Ī pilgrimage for religious beliefs was the initial reason for walking the Camino. These two combined make it very busy during July and August each year. It also has the best infrastructure of all the Camino routes. The Camino Frances has featured in many books and films (The Way and I’ll Push You). Pilgrims must walk at least 100 km to qualify for a Compostela in Santiago.

Sarria is the most popular place to start as it is 115 km from Santiago de Compostela. Roncesvalles, Pamplona, Logrono, Burgos, Leon, Ponferrade, and O’Cebreiro. In addition, the following towns and cities are popular places to start as they are easy to get to. Many pilgrims will start at various points along the way the most popular is Sarria. Saint Jean is a small market town nestled in the Pyrenees’ foothills, making for a tough first day over the hills. Saint Jean Pied de Port, in the South of France, is the main starting point. The other main Camino in France, the Arles Way, joins the Camino Frances Puente la Reina. These routes are the Paris and Tours route, the Vezelay route, and the Le Puy route. Three Camino pilgrimage routes in France converge into the Camino Frances. It is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site and was the first European Culture Routes in 1987. Now, after centuries of slumber, the Camino is alive with upward of 100,000 pilgrims-and growing-yearly.The route is also known as the French Way (the way of the Franks), as it was the route used by French pilgrims in the middle ages. The Camino fell into disfavor but was never abandoned. In the 17th century Louis XIV of France forbade his subjects from going to Santiago in order to stop trade with Spain. In the 1500s, Sir Francis Drake, who did more than his share of harassing the imperial Spanish, referred to Santiago as “that center of pernicious superstition.”Ī combination of the Protestant Reformation, the Enlightenment and European wars gradually suppressed the Camino. In The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer tells us that the Wife of Bath had been to Santiago. The Knights Templar patrolled the Camino, providing protection, places of hospitality, healing and worship, as well as a banking system that became one source of their fabled wealth.Īmong the historical figures who made the pilgrimage to Santiago are Charlemagne, Roldan, Francis of Assisi, Dante Alighieri and Rodrigo Diaz (El Cid, Spain’s great epic hero). Local kings and clergy built hospitals, hostels, roads and bridges to accommodate them. A legend that has persisted for 2,000 years claims that his followers took his body back to Galicia, where it was buried inland.īy the 12th and 13th centuries, half a million pilgrims made their way to and across northern Spain and back each year. On returning to Palestine he was beheaded by Herod, becoming the first apostolic martyr. When the apostles spread out across the known world to preach the Christian gospel, tradition has it that James the Greater came to Galicia. Some of the original road remains on today’s Camino. They built infrastructure, including a road from Bordeaux in modern France to Astorga in northwest Spain, to mine the area’s gold and silver. As part of their conquest of Europe, the Romans occupied Iberia by 200 B.C. For them, watching the sun set over the endless waters was a spiritual experience. The Camino de Santiago has its origins in pre-Christian times when people of the Celtic/Iberian tribes made their way from the interior to land’s end on the Atlantic coast of Galicia. As such, it ranks along with Rome and Jerusalem as one of Christendom’s great pilgrim destinations. It’s a route that writer James Michener-no stranger to world travel-calls “the finest journey in Spain, and one of two or three in the world.” He did it three times and mentions passing “through landscapes of exquisite beauty.” The European Union has designated it a European Heritage Route.Ĭhristians are attracted to this remote corner of Europe because of a legend that Santiago de Compostela is the burial place of the apostle James the Greater. Some of it wends its way over the remains of pavement laid down by the Romans two millennia ago. Much of the route described in a 900-year old guidebook is still in use today. Christians have traveled it for nearly 1,300 years. It’s a walkway trod by travelers of all kinds for more than 2,000 years.

The route known as the Camino de Santiago is neither a road nor a highway.

El camino de santiago route