EL CAMINO DE SANTIAGO (The Way of St. James)
A Pilgrimage - The French Route
500 miles from St. Jean Pied-de-Port, France to Santiago de Compostella, Galicia, Spain
Linda Roy Cross
Copyright pending
Revised April 2017
I've since written a book. Paper version $20 + 4.95 mailing. You may contact through the button at the end of the website. Good reviews!
Or: E-book: Alone on the Camino
Smashwords.com
$7.99
Is it safe for a woman to walk alone on the Camino? It was for me. I'm a senior citizen. I was 66 years old and walked in mid-May to mid-June, 2012 along The Way of Saint James across northern Spain beginning in St. Jean Pied-de-Port, France to Santiago de Compostella, Galacia, Spain. Afterward I wrote this website about my experiences on the Camino de Santiago.
With success I've had more than 30,000 website readers, some of which encouraged me to put the following into book form. On May 5, 1917, my Ebook, Alone on the Camino, will become available on smashwords.com at $7.99. Pre-orders are encouraged and your credit card will not be charged until you access your book on May 5, or after. I was encouraged by website readers, who also agreed my account may well be one among the many resources to encourage other senior citizens in my age group to help prepare for this journey. Hopefully, the website might also serve as a guide for what one might expect, both physically and emotionally, along the route. It was a mind, body, and spiritual experience for me. Every Camino is different. If you enjoy the website, the Ebook Alone on the Camino has even more insight. At $7.99, it's worth the look. UPDATE: I now have a paper version for sale. Contact me.
As a reality check it's important to remember that through the magic of film, in the popular movie The Way, Martin Sheen's character walked 500 miles in 123 minutes. Still, I enjoyed the movie. Watch it for the scenery if nothing else. If you have the DVD watch the optional trailers/interview. Serendipitously the movie came to the Loft, one of our local theaters, a few weeks after I had already booked a flight to Paris for the Camino.
I followed the pilgrim approach of carrying my own backpack and staying in co-ed shelters (alberques/hostels/dorms), along The Way, with co-ed showers and toilets and bunk beds. No regrets.
Within the following are photos and a narrative that describes my adventure. At some point during your reading you may get the feeling that I regretted the journey since I often whined and was frustrated at times. I'm simply telling it the way it was for me. There were some very difficult moments, but I would not trade the experience for anything. It was among one of the most amazing solo journeys of my life.
The following chapters are by date and in chronological order, except for the last chapter. Training for the Camino is about the beginning of my quest - the training and other mishaps - and of when I first heard about the Camino years earlier. I also describe how I injured my foot a week before leaving on the Camino and what the doctor told me. With feedback from my website I learned many readers are eager to get started, so I put that chapter at the end.
However, if you are so eager to start on the Camino without thought of training beforehand ... let the walker beware.
A map of the Camino Frances follows this page. I took the French route meaning it started on the French side of the Pyrennes at (1) St. Jean Pied-de-Port, France - up and over the Pyrenees to Roncesvalles, Spain - and continuing with a long walk to Santiago de Compostela, Spain. Afterward, I also traveled by bus to the Atlantic coast at Finisterre, known as Land's End. Of possible interest, there are a total of 12 different routes, some of which start in (2) Paris, (3) Vezelay, (4) Le Puy, (5) Arles (France) - (6) Valencia and Madrid, (7) Granada, (8) Seville, (9) Irun, and Oviedo-Lugo-Melide (Spain) - (10) Oporto, Lisbon (Portugal) - (11) Ferrol, (UK) - (12) Finisterre, Muxia, (Spain.)
Buen Camino & enjoy your journey
A Pilgrimage - The French Route
500 miles from St. Jean Pied-de-Port, France to Santiago de Compostella, Galicia, Spain
Linda Roy Cross
Copyright pending
Revised April 2017
I've since written a book. Paper version $20 + 4.95 mailing. You may contact through the button at the end of the website. Good reviews!
Or: E-book: Alone on the Camino
Smashwords.com
$7.99
Is it safe for a woman to walk alone on the Camino? It was for me. I'm a senior citizen. I was 66 years old and walked in mid-May to mid-June, 2012 along The Way of Saint James across northern Spain beginning in St. Jean Pied-de-Port, France to Santiago de Compostella, Galacia, Spain. Afterward I wrote this website about my experiences on the Camino de Santiago.
With success I've had more than 30,000 website readers, some of which encouraged me to put the following into book form. On May 5, 1917, my Ebook, Alone on the Camino, will become available on smashwords.com at $7.99. Pre-orders are encouraged and your credit card will not be charged until you access your book on May 5, or after. I was encouraged by website readers, who also agreed my account may well be one among the many resources to encourage other senior citizens in my age group to help prepare for this journey. Hopefully, the website might also serve as a guide for what one might expect, both physically and emotionally, along the route. It was a mind, body, and spiritual experience for me. Every Camino is different. If you enjoy the website, the Ebook Alone on the Camino has even more insight. At $7.99, it's worth the look. UPDATE: I now have a paper version for sale. Contact me.
As a reality check it's important to remember that through the magic of film, in the popular movie The Way, Martin Sheen's character walked 500 miles in 123 minutes. Still, I enjoyed the movie. Watch it for the scenery if nothing else. If you have the DVD watch the optional trailers/interview. Serendipitously the movie came to the Loft, one of our local theaters, a few weeks after I had already booked a flight to Paris for the Camino.
I followed the pilgrim approach of carrying my own backpack and staying in co-ed shelters (alberques/hostels/dorms), along The Way, with co-ed showers and toilets and bunk beds. No regrets.
Within the following are photos and a narrative that describes my adventure. At some point during your reading you may get the feeling that I regretted the journey since I often whined and was frustrated at times. I'm simply telling it the way it was for me. There were some very difficult moments, but I would not trade the experience for anything. It was among one of the most amazing solo journeys of my life.
The following chapters are by date and in chronological order, except for the last chapter. Training for the Camino is about the beginning of my quest - the training and other mishaps - and of when I first heard about the Camino years earlier. I also describe how I injured my foot a week before leaving on the Camino and what the doctor told me. With feedback from my website I learned many readers are eager to get started, so I put that chapter at the end.
However, if you are so eager to start on the Camino without thought of training beforehand ... let the walker beware.
A map of the Camino Frances follows this page. I took the French route meaning it started on the French side of the Pyrennes at (1) St. Jean Pied-de-Port, France - up and over the Pyrenees to Roncesvalles, Spain - and continuing with a long walk to Santiago de Compostela, Spain. Afterward, I also traveled by bus to the Atlantic coast at Finisterre, known as Land's End. Of possible interest, there are a total of 12 different routes, some of which start in (2) Paris, (3) Vezelay, (4) Le Puy, (5) Arles (France) - (6) Valencia and Madrid, (7) Granada, (8) Seville, (9) Irun, and Oviedo-Lugo-Melide (Spain) - (10) Oporto, Lisbon (Portugal) - (11) Ferrol, (UK) - (12) Finisterre, Muxia, (Spain.)
Buen Camino & enjoy your journey
"Poets claim that we recapture for a moment the self that we
were long ago when we enter some house or garden in which we used to live in
our youth. But these are most hazardous pilgrimages, which end as often in disappointment
as in success. It is in ourselves that we should rather seek to find those
fixed places, contemporaneous with different years.” In Search of Lost Time. Marcel Proust.
In the last chapter I write about training in the desert heat. I mistakenly trained in wool socks and developed vasculitis on the legs and this is what it looks like.