Dear Friends in Christ,

For more than a thousand years, men and women have walked across the top of Spain to stand before the tomb of the Apostle James. Kings walked it. Beggars walked it. St. Francis of Assisi is said to have walked it. The scallop shells they carried have been dug out of graves from Ireland to Poland.

We are going to walk the last hundred kilometres of it.

This is a pilgrimage, not a hiking holiday. We begin in Porto, cross into Galicia, and walk the Camino Portugués stage by stage through Redondela, Arcade, Pontevedra, Caldas de Reis and Padrón until we come down into Santiago de Compostela on foot. We celebrate Mass each day. We pray at the relics of the Apostle. Afterwards we drive to Finisterre, then east through O Cebreiro and Astorga to Ávila, the city of St. Teresa, before a last evening in Madrid.

THE PILGRIMAGE AT A GLANCE

Seven walking stages  ·  ~100 km  ·  longest day 22 km  ·  luggage sent ahead  ·  coach always nearby

Daily Mass  ·  optional Centering Prayer each morning  ·  Optional 11th Step / AA meeting each evening

You need not be an athlete — only willing to walk a country road, at your own pace, several days running.

“I rejoiced when I heard them say: let us go to the house of the Lord.”  —  Psalm 122:1