Exploring the unlikely intersections of walking, photography and making
The walk into León is a wet but short 19 kilometers. It's a rare opportunity to journey on foot from the perimeter of a city to its core. For instance, who has ever walked from semi-rural, semi-urban Headingley at the outer edge of Winnipeg to the Exchange District at the city’s core? The Camino forces... Continue Reading →
Rain. It has a way of stripping away sentimental thoughts. Yes, the colours are more vibrant. And there is a fragrance of grass in the air. But the grey sky presses down as we tread through puddles - boots, socks and feet ever more damp. The rain pelts against our glistening rainwear. Water ripples across... Continue Reading →
The 21-kilometre tramp from Frómista to Carrión de los Condes takes us further into the Meseta. Here, the villages are fewer, the land is flatter. Quiet reigns supreme. This is the time to count footsteps, the chant of the long-distance walker, as we cross this vast, open landscape at an almost imperceptible pace. Along... Continue Reading →
We left Castojeriz enveloped in a cool early morning fog, soon shot through with long shadows cast by the rising sun as we climb a steep slope to the Meseta plateau. This was the start of our 25-kilometre walk across flat land and deep blue skies towards Frómista. We had heard from fellow pilgrims that... Continue Reading →
The 26-kilometre path to Burgos crosses a vast swath of human history. It starts with a midday traverse of Atapuerca. Here, in limestone caves below the Atapuerca Massif, archaeologists uncovered (in 1994) a cache of human remains stretching across a pre-Christian era of 127,000 to 1,000,000 years ago. These are the oldest human remains in... Continue Reading →
The 23-kilometre trek from Santo Domingo to Belorado contrasted two worlds. To one side ran the slick, modern national highway N-120. Its twin ribbons of factory-fresh asphalt crossed the flat, brown landscape, requiring costly overpasses to lead pilgrims from one side to the other. Cars fly through this flat land, missing the details of an agricultural... Continue Reading →
Today’s 24-kilometre walk would lead us to three unique religious experiences. We left Nájera at first light on another beautiful blue-sky day, the sun rising over our shoulders, casting its long shadows towards our destination, Santo Domingo de la Calzada. We soon arrived at the 500-person hamlet of Azofra and made the proper decision to... Continue Reading →
It was still cool and dark when we left Los Arcos on our long 29-kilometre journey to Logroño. Soon the blackness gave way to deep blue skies, criss-crossed with orange contrails as the sun made its way over the horizon. By the time we were bathed in warmth, we had arrived at the historic pilgrimage... Continue Reading →
It was the type of day on the Camino that you wish would never end. The sun soaked us in warmth, demanding that we remove our zippered pant legs as we plied the gentle slopes on our walk to Estella. Along the way, history entertained us, first with the medieval hilltop village of Cirauqui, its... Continue Reading →
The 24 kilometre walk from Pamplona to Puenta La Reina illustrates the ongoing significance of the Camino to Northern Spain. It begins with the exit from Pamplona, a contemporary, well-maintained pathway through the suburbs of the city that, at its edge, bids farewell to pilgrims with a modern multi-lingual signpost. It is a sign that,... Continue Reading →