Smelly hipsters ruining the Camino

[jay quintero]

No need for any survival gear at all. The Camino is super luxury glamping after all. As for the cube speaker, please don't. If you enjoy listening to music, or podcasts, do so with earplugs.

"survival gear" is geared mostly to saving money/not relying on others ... heavy duty sewing kit, zip lock bags, food handler's gloves, water purification kit, duct tape, P-38 can opener, extra shoe laces, eyeglass repair kit, zip ties, etc, etc (everything combined, it weighs quite a bit - will again downsize) ... one can travel in two ways ... Macgyver or James Bond ... only one has an unlimited credit limit ...

 

[Anemone del Camino]

"survival gear" is geared mostly to saving money/not relying on others ... heavy duty sewing kit, zip lock bags, food handler's gloves, water purification kit, duct tape, P-38 can opener, extra shoe laces, eyeglass repair kit, zip ties, etc, etc (everything combined, it weighs quite a bit - will again downsize) ... one can travel in two ways ... Macgyver or James Bond ... only one has an unlimited credit limit ...

Why a heavy duty sewing kit? A needle, a few meters of thread, done.

Ziplocks are noisy and I don't see any use for them on the Camino.

Food handler gloves? What arw those?

Why ater purification kit?

Duct tape: 1 meter wrapped around your walking sticks is more than enough.

Why a can opener?

You don't need any of this. If an albergue doesn't have something, just do without for that night. But they all have can openers.

 

[KinkyOne]

As for being a genuine peregrino, @KinkyOne slept outside on an abandoned railroad platform bench on the Camino Levante. In my eyes, that makes him the real deal peregrino! But I don't think he looked like a hipster when he did it though...

It wasn't even the bench, just a concrete floor, my sleeping bag under me and backpack for a pillow. I was more than happy no local winos came around. Or maybe they did???
I can't take the credit of being the "real" pilgrim but thank you anyway, Matt

 

[pilgr]

50% is a conservative estimate. I'm still working my way down ... removed some non dual purpose clothes ... already ditched the travel adapter transformer, am still bringing the travel plugs though ... ditched the iPad, will buy a cheap iPhone for skype/facetime wifi communication ... maybe I don't need too much survival gear?etc, etc, etc ... found a non bluetooth "cube speaker", tempted to bring it ...

I used to clean the roadside here with the neighbors, this stopped when we found a used syringe a few weeks ago ... since then the roadside hasn't been mowed. we can't mow the roadside grass unless the ground is clear of debris (beer cans and plastic bottles mostly-at least it used to be mostly those) ...

You will be FAMOUS on the Camino if you carry 50% of your weight! Pilgrims might even build a monument in your name. For reference, I carried 5% of my weight including water.

 

[jay quintero]

@jay quintero,
Spain sells rice, beans, meat, fruit and cheese, amongst other things. The camino does not take place in the middle of the unchartered Amazon. Survival of the fittest is watered down to winning a bed at days end, and that is only in the high season.
Or are you truly a Jedi in search of a new sword/lightsaber. Someone kinda like Paulo Coelho finding is sword in the O'C.

I'm sure Spain sells those items ... but like all places, I have to allocate/designate a day as "market day+bath day" ...Decades ago, each town in Spain had a certain "market day" ... unsure if this is still true, but if there is a big supermarket in that town (or tourist town) you don't have to schedule ... being such, I have to buy enough for more than a couple of days - initially, about a week just to be on the safe side ... I believe I'll have to stop, rest, shop, cook, and super-bathe every 4-5 days lest I become too smelly. Will cook enough for 3 days and on the fourth day buy bread at the bakeshop and munch on ham, cheese, or chorizo (or all three?) ... this is what I did 30 years ago in Malaga - unsure if it's still practical today ... I kept running out of butane back then, food went bad ... made many mistakes ...

 

[Kanga]

Aren't there any garbage maintenance trucks that drive along the route?

No. And if you are carrying all the stuff you say you will, and cooking outside, then please, "Pack it in, pack it out".

Your plan sounds most unnecessary. Every day you will pass supermarkets and grocery stores and fresh produce stores and cafes and bakeries and restaurants and other food outlets - and Spain is used to diabetics.

Could we also please get back to the original topic? If people want to digress perhaps they could start a fresh thread.

 

[Marbe2]

We spend, on average somewhere around 40-50 euros per day per person. ON the other hand, there are those who spend less and that is fine. They stay in Refugio's and strictly budget their money. However, sometimes people are so frugal that they forget that many of the people running these facilities are eking out a living. FOr example, I heard a young man complain because the place he was staying out asked for 4 euros pp for lodgings and the lady wanted 9 euros to cook them an evening meal...as if she were cheating them? If one is making a pilgrimage (?) should we not be thinking only of where we go, but how we go? IS there not a balance between my needs and my neighbors? That one or two extra euros could make a difference to the host?

 

[jay quintero]

I wouldn't panic yet. The group of three protesters look more like performance artists to me than members of the "black block", a term used for groups of anarchists who turn violent during demonstrations. I associate these goups mainly with groups in large urban centres in Greece, Italy and Germany, btw, not in La Rioja/Spain.

According to this informative article in Spanish, the Logrono events are something completely different, namely a "new action of the ultrarationalist collective Homo Velamine", who have the "admitted objective of introducing a dose of additional surrealism into daily current affairs" (=actualidad, there's probably a better translation).

In one photo, the pilgrims in Logrono are mixing with the performer-protesters and look happy, so either they agree wholeheartedly or don't have a clue of what's going on as they don't understand Spanish.

What does mochiflautas mean?

Maybe the protesters are protesting the lack of hot water?

Off-topic content edited by Moderator

 

[jay quintero]

Jay, thank you for your determination to pick up litter along the Way. But PLEASE don't leave the filled bags along the trail -- there is nobody out there going to pick those up and take them away.
There are plenty of bins in the next town. If you're towing a wagon, please take the trash along to the next dumpster.
St. James will thank you.

Am having second thought about this ... I just recalled a schoolmate of mine who did something similar (early 90s) ... he got into trouble because he joined a group of hikers who wanted to clear some garbage on a trail of a certain unnamed country (on an unnamed continent) ... the law in that district was "if you pick something up, it's your responsibility" you can't gather it up and neatly put it in a pile ... guess what happened? they cancelled their plans. how did the saying go? "no good deed goes unpunished"?

 

[jay quintero]

What are the pilgrim dollars? 22o,000 pilgrims at, say, 20 euros a day?

So daily pilgrim expenditure would be about 4,400,000 - 4 million 400 thousand Euros??? Crikey!!!

restaurants mostly, I presume?

 

[Inbar]

Do you eat out everyday? Has anyone tried buying stuff at the grocery and just getting a loaf of bread at the bakery? How much would one spend if a person did that? how much does coffee cost? I plan on bringing a small stove and a kettle not only because I'm cheap, I'm also allergic to coffee creamer/milk but also because I'm prediabetic and have to take my coffee black (no sugar, no cream), pointless I think to buy take out coffee at a cafe at premium prices

I drink my coffee like you, because I avoid sugar and I'm vegan. In Spain they call it Cafe Solo and it costs 1 euro. Hardly expensive if you ask me.
We'd often buy stuff in the grocery store, it would regularly cost us 8 euro for food which lasted two people for dinner, breakfast and lunch. But it's not always easy to carry all this around and make your own food when you're tired, we just had no other choice. But you can do that.

 

[kdespot]

Well, honestly I feel like protesting in Oregon.
The freeways are packed, the prices are going crazy, and the charm of the city is being ruined by people with boatloads of money coming in and running out the locals.
There, I vented.

Just wait 'til the 21st. Might as well jump on board and rent out a room.

 

[Bradypus]

The BBC have just reported a story from Scotland: tourist numbers on the very rural Isle of Skye are so high that the national police service are asking people not to visit the island if they do not have reserved accommodation. Some local people are complaining that large numbers only stop for a few minutes to take photographs before getting back in their cars and leaving: contributing almost nothing to the local economy but creating pressure on overcrowded roads and parking places. A familiar litany of complaints.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-40872328/does-the-isle-of-skye-have-too-many-tourists

 

[domigee]

It's sad but I have often wondered how the locals cope with the constant stream of pilgrims through their space day after day. I have lived in what I thought was a high tourist area and found it difficult and it was nothing compared to the Camino Frances.

People in big cities live with it day in day out ! Try Paris or London even

 

[domigee]

Maybe my pack is always too heavy? the minimum I carry is 50% of my body weight (that's with cookware and sleeping gear) ... my backpack is the old Vietnam style ALICE pack ... 5 or 6 pounds empty ... I've clearly been watching too many zombie apocalypse movies ...

You're kidding, right?

 

[grayland]

Thread closed for now.
It has been hopelessly diverted into something else.
Enough