How the Camino has changed for me

[peregrina2000]

I’m just back from a two-part Camino. The Via Serrana from Gibraltar to Sevilla, and then the Invierno from Ponferrada. I am experiencing the standard post-camino letdown, so I thought I’d reflect a bit.

I have gone from walking the more popular caminos to the solitary ones, and maybe that has influenced (or maybe it just reflects) what the camino “means” for me nowadays. In my earlier days, it was all about the community, the sharing, the intense short-lived emotional bonds. I had many “camino families” over the years, and I’m still in touch with some of those people. But those experiences don’t happen on the Olvidado, the Ebro, the Levante, the Catalán, etc, and I found that my caminos sort of morphed into an opportunity for me to be completely in charge of myself with no one else’s needs to attend to (I am a caregive at home and it gets very stressful and hard on the spirits). An opportunity to disconnect, to challenge my physical limits, to be self-sufficient, to immerse myself in my surroundings while focusing on my own “inner stuff.”

I like the physical challenge and the opportunity to enjoy some of Spain’s amazing almost hidden cultural and historical sites. That’s why over the last few years I have spent a lot of time before walking identifying places near the camino that can be added in as detours — Roman ruins, waterfalls, Romanesque (and earlier) churches, monasteries, castles, etc. They all form part of the backdrop for me as I walk, and when I arrive at those places, I kind of break out of my inner cocoon and enjoy what they have to offer. That’s a very different kind of camino than when I started back in 2000. But what remains constant is the joyful gratitude I experience every single day as I reflect on how lucky I am to be doing this.

Just to say that not only is the Camino a very different thing for different people, but what the camino is for one person can and probably will change as the person changes and as the caminos change.

p.s. I’d love to hear others’ thoughts on this - especially if you’ve been walking caminos for many years.

 

[mspath]

Laurie,

Thank you for sharing your heartfelt thoughts. As always I so admire your perseverance and tenacity.

With endurance may we all eventually find welcome relief.

Deus nobis haec otia fecit/God has granted us this respite.
Virgil (Eclogues I, l.6)

Margaret Meredith

 

[Guateboston]

Every camino is different. Each Camino changes us. So our experiences change. Our needs change. The important part is that it keeps drawing us and we keep exploring them. And even if you walked the same camino for a second time it would be a completely different experience.

 

[filly]

I’m just back from a two-part Camino. The Via Serrana from Gibraltar to Sevilla, and then the Invierno from Ponferrada. I am experiencing the standard post-camino letdown, so I thought I’d reflect a bit.

I have gone from walking the more popular caminos to the solitary ones, and maybe that has influenced (or maybe it just reflects) what the camino “means” for me nowadays. In my earlier days, it was all about the community, the sharing, the intense short-lived emotional bonds. I had many “camino families” over the years, and I’m still in touch with some of those people. But those experiences don’t happen on the Olvidado, the Ebro, the Levante, the Catalán, etc, and I found that my caminos sort of morphed into an opportunity for me to be completely in charge of myself with no one else’s needs to attend to (I am a caregive at home and it gets very stressful and hard on the spirits). An opportunity to disconnect, to challenge my physical limits, to be self-sufficient, to immerse myself in my surroundings while focusing on my own “inner stuff.”

I like the physical challenge and the opportunity to enjoy some of Spain’s amazing almost hidden cultural and historical sites. That’s why over the last few years I have spent a lot of time before walking identifying places near the camino that can be added in as detours — Roman ruins, waterfalls, Romanesque (and earlier) churches, monasteries, castles, etc. They all form part of the backdrop for me as I walk, and when I arrive at those places, I kind of break out of my inner cocoon and enjoy what they have to offer. That’s a very different kind of camino than when I started back in 2000. But what remains constant is the joyful gratitude I experience every single day as I reflect on how lucky I am to be doing this.

Just to say that not only is the Camino a very different thing for different people, but what the camino is for one person can and probably will change as the person changes and as the caminos change.

p.s. I’d love to hear others’ thoughts on this - especially if you’ve been walking caminos for many years.

Dear Laurie,

You have been and remain a total inspiration. Your help, your guidance, your insights and now your inner thoughts - I applaud it all… as I enjoy a cuppa thanks to your recommendation of a water heating coil!! (Sourced in Burgos in an old fashioned electrical repair shop).

 

[David Tallan]

Each Camino has been different for me.

My first Camino was very much about connecting with medieval culture and identifying with the medieval pilgrims who had walked (or rode) the route before me.

My second was very much about spending quality time with my son, walking the route from beginning to end, enjoying the pilgrim community that had exploded over the intervening years, and enjoying (with my son) contemporary Spanish culture.

My third was about recharging my Camino battery, again enjoying the pilgrim community, and trying a different route. It felt too short, though.

My fourth one was a reaction to the "too short" walk from Porto and about doing the classic "front door" Camino with the Camino Madrid. It was also somewhat about challenging myself, both with the solitude of the Camino de Madrid and the mountains of the Salvador and Primitivo (which didn't end up seeming as tough as I anticipated).

My fifth Camino was about spending time with my daughter and, it turns out, about letting go of what a Camino "should be", which, come to think if it, has been a subtext of many of my previous Caminos.

My next Camino will likely be a reaction to this one and very different in turn.

 

[Bradypus]

I have gone from walking the more popular caminos to the solitary ones, and maybe that has influenced (or maybe it just reflects) what the camino “means” for me nowadays.

My first Camino was the Frances at a time when it was (a) the only recognised route and (b) a very solitary experience. I have walked the Frances more recently in peak season and decided that "community, the sharing, the intense short-lived emotional bonds" are just not what I want from my Camino journeys. These days even the Via de la Plata is busier than the Frances as I first knew it. I am walking the Portugues at the moment. In the time it took me to sit on a wall and eat a bocadillo this afternoon I saw more pilgrims pass by than in the whole 800km of that first Camino. This walk has been an interesting experience and in its own way very enjoyable but probably not what I will aim to find in future.

 

[naplesdon]

Laurie,
Thanks for your thoughts. I always enjoy meeting you whenever we cross paths. I started my Camino experience 10 year later than you did but after 3 or 4 years of the grind, I too began doing the solitary trails, off season, and began enjoying the seldom seen places no one bothers about exploring in Spain and Portugal. Suseya, mon amie!

 

[J.Patrick]

In my first Camino, I walked with another priest from Porto to SdC, and I don't think we ever stopped talking. We were professors in the same graduate program, he the spiritual director and I the scripture prof. We had a lot to process, and we had the time, and we used it well. I loved it and looked for more of the same.

In my second Camino, I intended to walk the Northern to the Primitivo to SdC, a couple of weeks with the same priest friend, a couple of weeks with my brother, and a week with a friend from college days. For very good reasons they all backed out on me and I ended up walking alone. At first I was a bit intimidated, but that solitude turned out to be the greatest blessing. The time in contemplation was so healing of life's memories, so rich in offering me a chance to welcome the graces of life, and step back from the toxic. I did meet people along the way for brief stretches (a Basque father walking with his daughter before she went off to college -- all in Spanish, which really stretched me; a single Canadian woman walking alone who was an absolute joy; a group of West coast seniors who, towards the end, became a sweet companionship in Santiago). I cherish most, though, the large empty spaces of that pilgrimage.

In my third Camino, from Lucca to Rome, I walked in the morning with a friend most days, and by myself in the afternoon, combining rich elements of both companionship and alone time in beautiful Tuscany. What a treasure to discover that after the other two pilgrimages, I didn't need as much time, either to talk or to be alone. I could simply enjoy them both for the sweet pleasure they offered.

I lead a very public life as a professor and a parish priest, and I have always had a rich relationship with a spiritual director, my siblings and other friends, as well as my parishioners, and so I was never hungry for the Camino family experience. I recognize that for many, that is the highlight of their pilgrimages, and in our disconnected world, it makes sense it would be. Isn't it wonderful to have different motives and opportunities on the Way

 

[Gobsmacked by the World]

The Camino has changed me forever. Actually physically walking the Camino has occupied perhaps 1% of my time, but now occupies 20% of all my conversations, to the annoyance of those who know me and haven't walked the Camino. The rest of you get it.

 

[Suzanne S.]

Ah, Laurie! I've walked three since 2015, so not as many or as frequently as some. I'm planning my fourth, as I rapidly approach 70, and am grateful for your invitation to ponder my experiences.

The first was the Frances. My hope was to find courage and independence, and myself. It was a life changing walk, and I found those things, as far as I knew them then. My second was the Portuguese, in 2017, with a friend from the first Camino. It was difficult in part, but only because I discovered some things about myself that I didn't like much, mostly my codependency and resentment. But I still found joy and beauty, and realized that I still had a lot of self discovery to look forward to.

My third was the Norte in 2019. I was not in good physical shape, which isn't wonderful for beginning in Irun. I walked "alone" within a cohort of 20 or so other pilgrims. It was challenging and I was able to honor my boundaries better. And it was stunning, unforgettable.

My fourth will be a combination of the Ebro from Zaragoza to Logrono or to the Soriano, and to Burgos via the Lana (I think!). Then the Frances across the meseta to Ponferrada and the Invierno. I am terrified! And excited. And I vacillate between having confidence that I can, and trepidation that I can't. I do know, that either way, I will have experienced more of Spain, and myself.

I have followed your wikilocs and am grateful that you so freely share your experiences. Between you, @Camino Chrissy , and so many others, I know I will be as prepared as I can get.

Thank you.

 

[naplesdon]

Finally a thread about the spirit of the Camino, not one about the bed race, aches, pains and food.

 

[VNwalking]

what the camino is for one person can and probably will change as the person changes and as the caminos change.

p.s. I’d love to hear others’ thoughts on this - especially if you’ve been walking caminos for many years.

A wonderful reflective question.
Mostly I've experienced an incremental increase in confidence - so the Caminos I'm drawn to now are ones I would never have considered before, not in a million years.

I began, like most, with the Francés, in 2014. I wasn't so aware of it (except in retrospect), but I was nervous then about even being able to cover the distance every day. So one camino gave confidence about that.

A second longer one -and many threads here - made me think more remote caminos might be possible after all. But boy was I chicken and it was obvious.

So I dipped my toe in the water with a third short excursion (one (planned) stage on the Lana and then the San Olav). It resulted in my getting totally lost on day one, and utterly hooked. Gobsmacking scenery and no-one around all day was total heaven. And (surprise surprise) I liked the challenges and meeting them.

Walking from Irun on the Vasco and ending up in Santiago from the Invierno - and some shorter quiet routes in the years before and after that - has only reinforced both the liking of solitude and the confidence in my ability to cope. Now I'm happy enough on the Francés if it's part of a Camino Mixta, but vastly prefer the quieter routes.

Not an unusual evolution, I imagine.

 

[DeansFamily]

Thanks Laurie for the wonderful thread. Our first Camino was a family adventure recommended by school principals we met at Ha Long Bay. My husband asked "what is the best thing you have every done" and they then spent the night telling us about this amazing time spent in Spain. Our daughter was learning Spanish through Distance Education so, off to do the Frances all the way to Muxia. We were captured by the Camino, and we took on the Norte and then the Primitivo, our daughter absorbing the language in the best way. We felt confident attempting the VdLP next and our daughter honed her skills at intensive language classes at Seville before heading out and at Salamanca, before we crossed over onto the Sanabres. We still fondly remember looking for the shell latch at Lubian for you, a delightful task in one of my favourite villages. Post COVID, and now a uni student, the 2 of us took on the Portuguese from Lisbon, and our daughter made her way from Australia to Porto to join us, her first big solo trip. My husband and myself now enjoy walking together, the Invierno, the Frances and Primitivo, a slower pace and out of season and rest days when we feel like it. So confident, we took on the Lycian Way and Peloponnese Way the last two months. We now prefer the quieter, cooler conditions and our Spanish has improved, now we don't rely on our daughter. We know what we need and as a result our packs keep getting lighter, and we are content to slow down and trust the Camino. There is no better way to imprint a country than by walking across it. The memory of so many beautiful and challenging moments on the Camino is so precious to me, and we have Camino friends and family around the globe that mean so much to us. Spain keeps calling us back "our Happy Place" and walking is the only way we are truly satisfied doing it. The VdLP is calling again so we'll be happily arriving in Seville come October.

 

[Rick of Rick and Peg]

In my third Camino, from Lucca to Rome, I walked in the morning with a friend most days, and by myself in the afternoon, combining rich elements of both companionship and alone time in beautiful Tuscany.

What a great way to do the walk.

On one of our local walks we had a short chat with a woman walking the other way. She was a therapist who walked with her clients (alone that day). She found conversations flowed easier walking.