Love Walking Thru Cities :-)

[Deleted member 67185]

 

[Albertagirl]

I want to walk all of it. In Burgos, I prefer the riverside walk into town, having done both. In Leon, I have walked the usual route out of the city twice and remember with fondness my fascination with the bodegas on my first walk through. One forum member referred to them as "hobbit houses." When I am in Spain, I am on pilgrimage, and I want to walk my pilgrimage. I don't care what anyone else does. I suppose I might be annoyed on a busy route if all the albergue beds were taken up by persons who got there by bus or taxi. But I don't really pay any attention to what other people do. I walk my walk. My only incident of struggle with this came in Jaca, when I decided to take a bus to San Juan de la Pena. I cannot regret that decision. But I still feel that I didn't really complete my pilgrimage. I might have stayed on the bus back to Jaca and walked from there a day later. I am not suggesting that this is right for anyone else. And I hope that I would be flexible in any sort of emergency. I did get my bag carried for two days on the VdlP, when the heat and distances were challenging. I would rather not have needed to, but believe that I chose right. So for me the moral of my story is to do what feels right for your walk, as you understand it. I don't see how I could have managed the walk up to and down from San Juan de la Pena, so I didn't try. But I feel that my sense of walking my pilgrimage could be fractured by taking a ride and I shall avoid doing so whenever I reasonably can. If you really feel a need to walk all your walk, you may have to decide whether that is more important to you than missing the urban areas. If it is more important, just accept it and get on with it.

 

[Cayou]

Loopholes .....
1. You might injure yourself walking too much on hard pavement
2. You might miss your flight home from Santiago
3. You don't normally hike in Vancouver or Toronto cities either
,,,, that's all I got

 

[tomnorth]

I want to walk all of it. In Burgos, I prefer the riverside walk into town, having done both. In Leon, I have walked the usual route out of the city twice and remember with fondness my fascination with the bodegas on my first walk through. One forum member referred to them as "hobbit houses." When I am in Spain, I am on pilgrimage, and I want to walk my pilgrimage. I don't care what anyone else does. I suppose I might be annoyed on a busy route if all the albergue beds were taken up by persons who got there by bus or taxi. But I don't really pay any attention to what other people do. I walk my walk. My only incident of struggle with this came in Jaca, when I decided to take a bus to San Juan de la Pena. I cannot regret that decision. But I still feel that I didn't really complete my pilgrimage. I might have stayed on the bus back to Jaca and walked from there a day later. I am not suggesting that this is right for anyone else. And I hope that I would be flexible in any sort of emergency. I did get my bag carried for two days on the VdlP, when the heat and distances were challenging. I would rather not have needed to, but believe that I chose right. So for me the moral of my story is to do what feels right for your walk, as you understand it. I don't see how I could have managed the walk up to and down from San Juan de la Pena, so I didn't try. But I feel that my sense of walking my pilgrimage could be fractured by taking a ride and I shall avoid doing so whenever I reasonably can. If you really feel a need to walk all your walk, you may have to decide whether that is more important to you than missing the urban areas. If it is more important, just accept it and get on with it.

Ah, I remember those bodegas. I thought they were so fascinating.

 

[Deleted member 67185]

I want to walk all of it. In Burgos, I prefer the riverside walk into town, having done both. In Leon, I have walked the usual route out of the city twice and remember with fondness my fascination with the bodegas on my first walk through. One forum member referred to them as "hobbit houses." When I am in Spain, I am on pilgrimage, and I want to walk my pilgrimage. I don't care what anyone else does. I suppose I might be annoyed on a busy route if all the albergue beds were taken up by persons who got there by bus or taxi. But I don't really pay any attention to what other people do. I walk my walk. My only incident of struggle with this came in Jaca, when I decided to take a bus to San Juan de la Pena. I cannot regret that decision. But I still feel that I didn't really complete my pilgrimage. I might have stayed on the bus back to Jaca and walked from there a day later. I am not suggesting that this is right for anyone else. And I hope that I would be flexible in any sort of emergency. I did get my bag carried for two days on the VdlP, when the heat and distances were challenging. I would rather not have needed to, but believe that I chose right. So for me the moral of my story is to do what feels right for your walk, as you understand it. I don't see how I could have managed the walk up to and down from San Juan de la Pena, so I didn't try. But I feel that my sense of walking my pilgrimage could be fractured by taking a ride and I shall avoid doing so whenever I reasonably can. If you really feel a need to walk all your walk, you may have to decide whether that is more important to you than missing the urban areas. If it is more important, just accept it and get on with it.

You took my post waaaay too seriously

I, too, enjoyed the Burgos River route.

 

[PaulCat]

You make your own Camino. For some that means walking all the way. For others it means an occasional taxi or bus or stay at a nicer hotel one night or to a luggage service to Currier you bags.

 

[linkster]

I like the gritty feel in the early morning hours. It provides a balance for the rest of the day.

 

[Camino Chrissy]

You took my post waaaay too seriously

I, too, enjoyed the Burgos River route.

I was going to tell you that you had waaaay too much time on your hands starting this thread (like so many of us who spend quite a bit of time on this forum). Lol!

 

[KinkyOne]

I'm a city child. But lived with and in nature all my life. I suck up the nature, the peace, the birds singing and so on. But when I'm in the city (on Camino) I enjoy it equally. It's like the saying that you have the most peace when you are surrounded with people. I just sat there and watch life goes by.
As for walking - well, I hate the asphalt

 

[C clearly]

I think I remember @Rebekah Scott suggesting that farm vehicles and city buses did not count as rides.

 

[Albertagirl]

You took my post waaaay too seriously

I, too, enjoyed the Burgos River route.

@davebugg
There are several feet of snow outside my Calgary apartment, I am in the last stages of cabin fever, and I'm not going on camino this year. I haven't had a sense of humour for at least a month.

 

[Anamiri]

I did the 'industrial' entry into Burgos, you're right, its not particularly attractive, and coming from a country where we drive on the left hand side of the road, I nearly got myself run over.
I think Burgos is worse to walk into, not so bad to leave. Whereas Leon is about the same both ways I think. Leon seemed to take a long time to leave, to get out into open countryside. Or maybe it was because I had a great conversation with a French woman on the way into Leon, and it took my mind off the walk.

If you don't want to take a taxi, you could walk those bits early in the morning while its dark, and you wont be able to see so much.

Next year when I go back, I plan to taxi out of Leon, and start our Camino about 25kms out of Astorga.

 

[Kanga]

I think I remember @Rebekah Scott suggesting that farm vehicles and city buses did not count as rides.

Yes, and the definition of “farm vehicle” is broad!

 

[Susan Peacock]

It's your own Camino....no guilt.... do it like you want. On my first Camino I slugged out of Leon on foot, while a good part of my Camino family bused to the edge of town. I admit that I was jealous as I walked through the suburbs. Second Camino I bused a few km to the edge of town and this allowed me to stay in a different town further down the trail than I had the first Camino. It set me up to stay in different places without having to change my daily distances. Leaving for Spain again tomorrow and will just see what my new Camino family wants to do

 

[trecile]

I'll take asphalt over those rocks on the descent from Alto de Perdón any day!
Though I wouldn't want to miss one single step if any of it.

 

[JabbaPapa]

No "purist" approach can really "justify" it -- but I have taken long detours to avoid large cities on at least five separate occasions (Bordeaux, Léon, Florence, Siena, Nice), so that's an alternative you could consider without "cheating".

Pamplona is sprawling and impossible to evade.

And Logroño should not be avoided IMO.

Finding a long alternative route avoiding Burgos completely should not be too hard, though finding where to sleep might be a problem in some pueblos. (or it might not be -- the Spaniards are surprisingly welcoming to pilgrims who step off the beaten path to visit and walk through their villages)

Avoiding Léon is a little more complex, and whilst I managed my own way in a single day by walking over 40 K, it had its difficulties, and I'd actually suggest leaving the official route at El Burgo Ranero, head towards Gusendos then Patares de los Oteros to end at Valencia de Don Juan ; then across to Santa Maria del Paramo ; from there up to Hospital de Orbigo on the Francès. (my own more northerly route required some hiking across open and trackless scrubland, crossing a small motorway with no pedestrian crossing, and is not at all recommendable)

Astorga is unavoidable, but the approach to the city isn't bad, and one is quickly out of it too.

Ponferrada is the one that really hems you in, and the Camino already takes the least painful route.

---

Otherwise, I've found that the best attitude to take is not to try and escape from the urban sections of the Way, but to embrace them -- get some supermarket shopping done, take a little rest when you're tired and bored in some little café or bar, seek the positives there, where you can find them, instead of focusing on what you perceive as negatives.

It's not always fun to walk through certain industrial suburban sections certainly -- but if the Camino is to be more than just a tourist hike, to have walked all the way, and I mean later, in looking back and knowing that you took all of the "bad" with all of the "good", is irreplaceable.

 

[JabbaPapa]

I think I remember @Rebekah Scott suggesting that farm vehicles and city buses did not count as rides.

I'd agree with her about the farm vehicles ; not about the city buses, with the obvious exception of perhaps using some "off-Camino" to get about town in the afternoon and evening after having walked to one's refugio for one's touristy purposes.

 

[Deleted member 67185]

Wow... what was meant to be a facetious and not serious post sure backfired on me. I'm sorry that I started the thread. Mea culpa.

To clarify, I'm really not trying to justify avoiding urban walking, nor am I feeling uncertain about it or that it is a burden or particularly horrible.

 

[Victoria65]

Wow... what was meant to be a facetious and not serious post sure backfired on me. I'm sorry that I started the thread. Mea culpa.

To clarify, I'm really not trying to justify avoiding urban walking, nor am I feeling uncertain about it or that it is a burden or particularly horrible.

Yeah, Davebugg but your "not serious" post became a fun thread to read. Always interesting to read differences of opinions. Now here's a business idea; purchase a small convoy of "pilgrim shuttles" strategically placed at the entrance of each urban area and shuttle pilgrims to the other side. Disguise them as "farm equipment" so those tired souls don't feel guilty.

 

[Bradypus]

I don't mind the cities but if I walk the Camino Frances again I'll be poring over maps for weeks to find a good way of bypassing Sarria. A town I used to be very fond of but now a hideous Camino theme park that does terrible things to my blood pressure

 

[Robo]

Wow... what was meant to be a facetious and not serious post sure backfired on me. I'm sorry that I started the thread. Mea culpa.

To clarify, I'm really not trying to justify avoiding urban walking, nor am I feeling uncertain about it or that it is a burden or particularly horrible.

The written word is so often taken the wrong way.

But ...... I've been thinking along the same lines........ Seriously, not just in fun

My dearly beloved walking partner has Plantaar Faciitis. Getting cortizone injections tomorrow.
We're doing a 'his and hers'. I'm getting my shots in the Achilles

But I'm thinking of how to avoid additional injury. Her shots will wear off about half way, and even then they only 'take the edge' off the pain. She'll be down to a 2 kph hobble with 4 hourly meds if we are not careful.

I know with my Achilles problems, pounding the pavements really kills them.

So we might just jump the odd bus now and again.........into Burgos, out of Leon. Those long pavement pounding sections are just not worth the additional 'inevitable' injury in my mind. (on a pre-existing condition)

Oh No. I've outed myself

We'll pretend we are Pilgrims in the Middle Ages sitting on a farm cart for a 5 km ride

But we'll see how we go and only resort to a 'farm cart' as a last resort

As others have said, it's nice to look back and know you walked it all........

 

[Kathor1]

Yeah, Davebugg but your "not serious" post became a fun thread to read. Always interesting to read differences of opinions. Now here's a business idea; purchase a small convoy of "pilgrim shuttles" strategically placed at the entrance of each urban area and shuttle pilgrims to the other side. Disguise them as "farm equipment" so those tired souls don't feel guilty.

Agree with the first part of your comment and love your proposal .

Or how about this as justification to oneself, @davebugg: the agony while taking a city bus is a worthy contemporary surrogate for the anguish of the pilgrims of old who had to deal with wolf attacks, poisonous river water, dying horses, and vicious ferrymen? I'd support you as long as you only take local buses, if you resort to taxis you'd be on your own.

Edited: I've now deleted the last part of my message because I realised that I wrote it mainly to announce to the world at large whether I walked into Burgos or took the bus. So funny how we feel we have to justify such unimportant behaviours/actions/choices to others.

 

[Undermanager]

I really love walking in and out of cities, most of the time. Madrid was an exception, where it was just urban sprawl. I loved walking into e.g. Leon, when you see churches, cathedrals and others walking in doing the same. Leaving is good too as you usually leave early and watch the city start to think about coming alive, and I love that move from city to countryside. Walking in and out of cities always reminds me of the book Jude the Obscure, where a lot of that happened in Victorian times!

 

[onwayhome]

Great post. I've heard that some Camino routes go back to the 8th century so you might have a lot of scope for choosing the 'authentic' city boundaries to suit your transport requirements!

 

[Camino Chrissy]

I'll take asphalt over those rocks on the descent from Alto de Perdón any day!
Though I wouldn't want to miss one single step if any of it.

I think those particular rocks were kind of fun to navigate...seriously! Asphalt is so boring. Lol!

 

[Camino Chrissy]

...Well, as long as you don't twist your ankle!

 

[David Manzo]

I agree with others. It’s your own Camino. Do as you see fit.

That said I’m a lover of cities. I live in one and teach about cities at Boston College. So I’m one who enjoys walking through them and do often.

 

[t2andreo]

Just thinking about this logically, if you ascribe to the "anti-soulless industrial estate belt crowd" like me, you usually look for a way to short-cut your walk INTO a city with a large industrial belt. Then, after spending one or more nights in that city, you also look for a way to shortcut the passage through the industrial belt on the other (outboard) side. This usually means a short bus or taxi ride on both short legs. Got it?

Well, if you combine these two links together, but without the night in the city in the middle, what do you have? A city bypass, I think? You take one ride into the city bus station, and a second out of the city. Alternatively, you find a walking bypass.

While in ancient times, back-in-the-day, there was relative safety in numbers in the cities, many pilgrims might think the opposite nowadays. I share the creepy feeling one gets after walking for a week or ten days in the countryside, then stumbling into a more or less major metropolis with all its noise, smells, distractions and challenges to safety...gotta look BOTH ways when crossing the streets...

Whatever their reason, Rule One applies. "You walk your own Camino. NO one else has the right or standing to challenge how you choose to accomplish your Camino.

This established, and while I respect everyone's right to do just this, there are a plethora of things to do and see in any of the larger cities along the various Caminos. My personal thought is that you SHOULD visit these cities as they were and are important stopping places along the Camino. But, once you have 'been there and done that," I could also argue that subsequent passages through that urban core might be truncated or deleted all together, if it adds quality to your Camino.

Hope this helps.

 

[Sidekick]

Wow this is timely for me. I’m on the camino Frances now. Just crippled in to town with two bad knees. It pains me to say I’m afraid I need to take bus to next town This is my first camino and I trained hard but still have knee issue. I feel guilty having to give up a day of walking but I’m inching my way along. Camino is raining - windy and cold. Going down those hills is a killer. Anyway in jest or not thanks all for allowing me to be less guilty. Buen Camino.

 

[Paladina]

But, drat it all, the amount of walking that those early pilgrims did also encompassed all the mileage leading into those cities and then departing them. That means that the only real change is what decorates all that mileage. Just because trees and fields once occupied the same space which now holds factories, warehouses, manufacturing plants, etc, does not mean that the actual walking mileage has increased from the past to the present.

For most modern pilgrims the mileage has indeed decreased. Unlike their medieval forebears they are not condemned to walk all the way back from Santiago to their port of entry. But you can leave the self-flagellation for the Sunday processions. If indulgences were still common currency the infernal road to La Coruna would surely earn the remission of all pilgrim sins. Noxious medieval tanneries outside towns seem quite benign in comparison with fleets of articulated trucks. This cyclist found it not merely unsightly but truly terrifying.

 

[David Tallan]

This is sort of a silly mental exercise.

Since those earlier pilgrims only had to traverse a much smaller urban area, then I am well justified to only have to walk that breadth through the city.

I'm sure that most medieval or 17th century pilgrims would have gratefully accepted any rides that were offered. Think of what you can do with that loophole!

 

[jayree]

I was surprised that the Camino routes through many cities actually avoid much of the modern day city, perhaps in part because the Camino was there almost a millennium before now. Pamplona, Logroño, Bilbao almost seemed intimate. The only unfavorable "city walk" I remember was Burgos and that is easily avoided with the river walk approach.

 

[JabbaPapa]

Wow this is timely for me. I’m on the camino Frances now. Just crippled in to town with two bad knees. It pains me to say I’m afraid I need to take bus to next town This is my first camino and I trained hard but still have knee issue. I feel guilty having to give up a day of walking but I’m inching my way along. Camino is raining - windy and cold. Going down those hills is a killer. Anyway in jest or not thanks all for allowing me to be less guilty. Buen Camino.

Really, just get yourself a rest day, or two if necessary.

Like THERE and NOW.

Seriously.

I hope that you have not hemmed yourself into a particular journey out departure day, but if not, there is no reason at all to try and compensate for any non-walking days by motor transport.

It's not a race ; it's not a Brierly-defined obstacle course ; your knee should be in charge of if you walk or not, and neither your schedule, nor a bus timetable, nor some abstract expectation of what you're meant to do.

but, well, bottom line :

Buen Camino !!

 

[linkster]

Wow... what was meant to be a facetious and not serious post sure backfired on me. I'm sorry that I started the thread. Mea culpa.

To clarify, I'm really not trying to justify avoiding urban walking, nor am I feeling uncertain about it or that it is a burden or particularly horrible.

Thread responses are like the Camino ... everybody responds their way.

The question is not how far. The question is do you possess the constitution, the depth of faith, to go as far as is needed?

 

[JabbaPapa]

I'm sure that most medieval or 17th century pilgrims would have gratefully accepted any rides that were offered. Think of what you can do with that loophole!

Actually, no -- most pilgrims of that period actually wanted to refuse such luxuries, to the point that many even refused to wash their bodies and their clothes during the entirety of their pilgrimages, until the very last day before reaching the shrine.

Which is a degree of puritanism that I'd hardly recommend, but mediaeval hitch-hikers along the Camino were still more the exception than the norm.

There's still a great risk of over-abstraction -- jumping onto a horse and cart involves caring for the horse, which is by no means the same as jumping onto a tractor or a motor bus.

Having said all that, not one single pilgrimage that I have undertaken has been absent, for one reason or another, of some requirement of motor transport, whether from illness, or from unexpectedly bumping into friends of the family, bad choice from tiredness, whatever. But I've found that it's best to avoid such transport and not seek it, and that one's Camino is purer by doing so.

 

[John Sikora]

If you don't walk through the cities then you have no excuse to stop for a cafe au lait or a torta. Walking a few miles or hours through a city watching all the people absorbed in what they are doing in that minute of time makes the walk of the Camino so much better.

 

[Deleted member 67185]

If you don't walk through the cities then you have no excuse to stop for a cafe au lait or a torta. Walking a few miles or hours through a city watching all the people absorbed in what they are doing in that minute of time makes the walk of the Camino so much better.

All very good reasons

 

[natefaith]

 

[David Tallan]

Actually, no -- most pilgrims of that period actually wanted to refuse such luxuries, to the point that many even refused to wash their bodies and their clothes during the entirety of their pilgrimages, until the very last day before reaching the shrine.

I am curious as to your source for this. The contemporary sources I've read, like the Canterbury Tales, certainly paint a very different picture of pilgrims. Even in the Codex Calixtinus, if I remember correctly, pilgrims were warned about rivers that would poison their horses, suggesting strongly that they weren't averse to riding.

 

[Deleted member 67185]

I am curious as to your source for this. The contemporary sources I've read, like the Canterbury Tales, certainly paint a very different picture of pilgrims. Even in the Codex Calixtinus, if I remember correctly, pilgrims were warned about rivers that would poison their horses, suggesting strongly that they weren't averse to riding.

Interesting. I had thought the Codex warned pilgrims to avoid rivers that had been known to poison horses.

 

[David Tallan]

Interesting. I had thought the Codex warned pilgrims to avoid rivers that had been known to poison horses.

"Beware from drinking its waters or watering your horse in its stream, for this river is deadly. While we were proceeding towards Santiago, we found two Navarrese seated on its banks and sharpening their knives: they make a habit of skinning the mounts of the pilgrims that drink from that water and die." Codex Calixtinus: Book V, trans. Melczer, 88-90 as quoted in The Pilgrimage Road to Santiago: The Complete Cultural Handbook by David M. Gilitz and Linda Kay Davidson

When I read "a habit of skinning the mounts of the pilgrims" it makes me think that pilgrims were not as averse to riding as has been presented here. I'm not saying that plenty of pilgrims didn't walk. Horses weren't cheap.

 

[Jill81]

I don't mind the cities but if I walk the Camino Frances again I'll be poring over maps for weeks to find a good way of bypassing Sarria. A town I used to be very fond of but now a hideous Camino theme park that does terrible things to my blood pressure

Love your new Kumano avatar!

 

[Thornley]

I bused a few km to the edge of town and this allowed me to stay in a different town further down the trail than I had the first Camino

The greatest invention is the no 1 bus to Virgin del Camino,
Because of road works in 2008 that 5km stretch took over 2 hours .
Most pilgrims arrived in Mazariffe mid afternoon and the attitude was
"Not happy Jane"

 

[lt56ny]

As others have said you walk your own Camino. I am walking the Norte in September. I will stay 2 days in San Sebastián and when I start in Irun and sleep in Pasajes. Next morning up early and walk through San Sebastián. I am planning on doing that in Bilboa and Santander. Cities can be very jarring. But than again one never knows what the Camino has in store for each one of us! The only plan, after walking 3 Caminos, I am sure of is that plans are forgotten quickly and/or proven to be non applicable about 15 paces into the first morning of the first day!

 

[tomnorth]

As others have said you walk your own Camino. I am walking the Norte in September. I will stay 2 days in San Sebastián and when I start in Irun and sleep in Pasajes. Next morning up early and walk through San Sebastián. I am planning on doing that in Bilboa and Santander. Cities can be very jarring. But than again one never knows what the Camino has in store for each one of us! The only plan, after walking 3 Caminos, I am sure of is that plans are forgotten quickly and/or proven to be non applicable about 15 paces into the first morning of the first day!

I couldn't agree more. I'm as guilty of planning too much as the next person. But what I've come to realize is that at best, my planning helps me determine what is possible, not was is probable or even what is likely to happen.

 

[JabbaPapa]

I am curious as to your source for this. The contemporary sources I've read, like the Canterbury Tales, certainly paint a very different picture of pilgrims. Even in the Codex Calixtinus, if I remember correctly, pilgrims were warned about rivers that would poison their horses, suggesting strongly that they weren't averse to riding.

Several, including a French doctoral thesis on the pilgrimage to Jerusalem during the Middle Ages.

The Canterbury Tales is basically a Satire, not an impartial description of pilgrim experiences nor practices.

The Codex Calixtinus has no proto-sociological nor proto-anthropological purposes either.

 

[JabbaPapa]

it makes me think that pilgrims were not as averse to riding as has been presented here

I'm not sure that anyone has suggested anything of the sort -- there were horse-and-carriage pilgrims too ...

 

[JabbaPapa]

The greatest invention is the no 1 bus to Virgin del Camino

I've only ever taken that bus on the return journey from Compostela to France, that I still hope to walk properly at least once rather than hike with some hitching.

I would never use such transport during the pilgrimage as such, unless in serious need.

 

[Prentiss Riddle]

And Logroño should not be avoided IMO.

I agree. I loved Logroño (the crazy pintxo street!) and I enjoyed the walk in and out of it.

On the way in, a pine forest followed by a view of the city and a marshy wildlife reserve, then a bit of an industrial area and a working-class neighborhood with memorable street life, finally the river and a welcome to the old town at a very friendly pilgrim office.

On the way out you put the town behind you pretty fast, then for a few km you’re in a string of parks much enjoyed by locals.

What’s not to like?

 

[Thornley]

I would never use such transport during the pilgrimage as such, unless in serious need.

On the day we did use No1 the bus was full of pilgrims ,
They had been advised by the albergue , hostels , pensions and hotels do not walk unless you want to add 2 plus hours to reach Virgin at the earliest . The roads were dug up , roads were closed , signs and markers did not exist , it was bedlam .
We stayed in Alb. Jesus in Mazariffe and the ones arriving mid to late afternoon had lunch in Virgin , thats how long it took to reach there .

 

[Dianes954]

I want to walk all of it. In Burgos, I prefer the riverside walk into town, having done both. In Leon, I have walked the usual route out of the city twice and remember with fondness my fascination with the bodegas on my first walk through. One forum member referred to them as "hobbit houses." When I am in Spain, I am on pilgrimage, and I want to walk my pilgrimage. I don't care what anyone else does. I suppose I might be annoyed on a busy route if all the albergue beds were taken up by persons who got there by bus or taxi. But I don't really pay any attention to what other people do. I walk my walk. My only incident of struggle with this came in Jaca, when I decided to take a bus to San Juan de la Pena. I cannot regret that decision. But I still feel that I didn't really complete my pilgrimage. I might have stayed on the bus back to Jaca and walked from there a day later. I am not suggesting that this is right for anyone else. And I hope that I would be flexible in any sort of emergency. I did get my bag carried for two days on the VdlP, when the heat and distances were challenging. I would rather not have needed to, but believe that I chose right. So for me the moral of my story is to do what feels right for your walk, as you understand it. I don't see how I could have managed the walk up to and down from San Juan de la Pena, so I didn't try. But I feel that my sense of walking my pilgrimage could be fractured by taking a ride and I shall avoid doing so whenever I reasonably can. If you really feel a need to walk all your walk, you may have to decide whether that is more important to you than missing the urban areas. If it is more important, just accept it and get on with it.

I am doing my first walk and am worried about the weather April 30-May 6. I read it is raining daily, very muddy, river overflowing, can only walk on the road. Any advice?

 

[Albertagirl]

I am doing my first walk and am worried about the weather April 30-May 6. I read it is raining daily, very muddy, river overflowing, can only walk on the road. Any advice?

@Dianes954
I can only suggest not to borrow trouble from the future. Whatever weather there is now is likely to change by the end of April, which is still two weeks away and cannot be predicted at this point. Rivers will go down and mud will dry. Look forward to your walk and take the present weather as a reminder to take rain gear with you, just in case. You may reasonably hope to have perfect weather in early May, but there is never any guarantee. Buen camino, whatever the weather.

 

[Thornley]

I am doing my first walk and am worried about the weather April 30-May 6. I read it is raining daily, very muddy, river overflowing, can only walk on the road. Any advice?

Cross that bridge when you are there , all the worrying in the world will not change things.
You will be walking within a group , maybe 50 people , just enjoy.
Worry about the rain when you get near SDC