Places along el Camino

After thinking a bit about my official 828-kilometer Journey and reading a lot of things about the Camino, the realization came to me that folks are often interested in the places a pilgrim encountered along the way. My guess is that every peregrino’s memory bank is full of places along el Camino. Mine certainly is.

Introduction

The places along el Camino section of my blog will be my best attempt to describe a few of the places that enriched my Journey. The places selected will be arbitrary based on my memory and what data is available in my photos and notes. If necessity forces me to use something from the Internet, it will be clearly marked.

Importantly, my Journey was along el Camino del Norte from Irún, where I began my Journey on August 4, 2018, to Arzúa and then along el Camino Frances from Arzúa to the Cathedral Square in Santiago, where I arrived on August 1, 2024 (a post describing that day is planned, but not yet executed), or almost exactly six years later. Thus, there will be no discussions of the many wonderful places along el Camino that are to be found on other routes.

At least for now. As this is written in the spring of 2024, injuries have imposed limits on my plans through the height of the coming summer. While those same injuries have failed to impose any limits on my dreams, they are limiting my Camino experience to reminiscence (and planning) rather than active hiking.

Three segments

El Camino del Norte has, by my experience, three segments. The first is from Bayonne (or Irún) to Ribadeo, the second from Ribadeo to Arzúa, and the third from Arzúa to Santiago and the Cathedral as shown on this map.

Irún to Ribadeo

The first of the three segments is right along Spain’s northern coast, which faces the Bay of Biscay. Despite the appearance of the map, this segment is far from homogeneous. The Basque Country contains two very special places along el Camino, San Sebastian and Bilbao. It is very different from Cantabria and Cantabria from Asturias. These changes tend to occur slowly so that they are not obvious at the time.

The Gulf Stream in this area has turned south from the Arctic and is a major factor in the weather. This is one of the things that unifies the Irún to Ribadeo segment

Guidebooks tell me that the coastal weather combines relatively mild conditions with a blustery, rainy day two or three days in the average week. My own experience from Irún to Ribadeo, where el Camino del Norte turns a bit southwest and away from the coast, is that this is true for the summer months.
The scenery is generally spectacular. This is sometimes because of ocean views, sometimes because of mountain views, and sometimes due to the works of humankind. Where the scenery is not spectacular, the hike through Bilbao comes instantly to mind, there are other rewards to be enjoyed, the Guggenheim in Bilbao for example.

Ribadeo to Arzúa

The del Norte changes with its turn to the southwest at Ribadeo. The weather became drier. The terrain changes from coastal to mountainous. The scenery seems, in memory at least, to evolve into something a bit less challenging; certainly at Abadín, but somehow even earlier at Mondoñedo despite the long climb.
If the terrain is different, the pilgrims are more different, still! It seems as though there are instantly more peregrinos. The shift at one specific place along el Camino, Baamonde, is beyond notable. Where many of the pilgrims one meets along the path to Gijón, for example, are embarked upon a Journey, the pilgrims beginning at Baamonde are more likely to be focused on a destination: Santiago. They go to Baamonde by bus, pick up the Camino at the 100-kilometer mark, and qualify for their Compostela in the process of experiencing their own Journey and its magic from there.

Arzúa to Santiago

If “Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown” is an iconic quote, I’ll do it one better: “Forget it, pilgrim. It’s the Frances.” The del Norte that I loved from Irún to Ribadeo and its sibling from Ribadeo to Arzúa definitely ended at a specific place along el Camino: Arzúa. The Frances is very different. Different terrain. Far, far more pilgrims. And if there were more than a few pilgrims who joined the del Norte at Baamonde, there seemed to be even more who joined the Frances at some equivalent 100-kilometer spot.

The fact that I arrived in Arzúa as World Youth Day approached and the young people hiking to Santiago as part of that celebration turned Arzúa into what appeared to be a village-wide party did nothing to reduce this impression of change.