Our Walk Along the Camino Portuguese

Reflecting on the Camino from Porto to Tui Camino Portuguses Considerations While the trek on the Camino Portuguese from Lisbon to Porto is substantially different than the Camino Frances in Spain, once you reach Porto things change both subtly and dramatically. From Lisbon to Porto, as we have already noted, there are potentially longer distances between albergues, which means longer hiking distances per day, overall there are fewer pilgrim amenities, and vast sections of The Way are on harder surfaces such as cobblestone tracts, ash vault roadways, or tiled and concrete sidewalks. In short, it is a tough way to start a hike. From Porto onward, however, much of this changes.  The Way of St. James in Portugal Simply put, if you loved the Camino Frances (I mean who doesn’t) and want more of the same, then this section will be to your liking – more yellow arrows, closer albergue stops, more rest stops with refreshments, and more pilgrim-centred facilities. Admittedly t...

Mosteiro and Museums on the Camino Portuguese  Camino Pilgrimage We spent a sleepless night listening to a new pilgrim in a room down the hall from us have a very noisy meltdown that lasted until we left in the morning. As a result, today's hike felt pretty long and tiring.     The walk out of Porto was, as expected, along busy streets and suburbs at the edges of town. We stopped at a cafe on the edge of town for coffee and then kept going. Setting out from Porto  Although we had been expecting to see a huge influx of new pilgrims leaving Porto, when we passed the pilgrim albergue around 7 AM there was only one lone man setting out, still struggling to adjust his backpack, manage his trekking poles, and carry his guidebook all at once. When we stopped for coffee he went ahead, and that was the last we saw of him. As we passed beyond the city limits we began to hear birds singing again, and the air smelled of hay and cows instead of exha...

Reflecting on Lisbon to Porto  Camino Portuguese Pilgrimage For us, our time on the Camino to Santiago began in 2016 along the Camino Frances and came after 18 months of struggling. One of us experienced a collapse in our life after a year of losing almost everything and experiencing extreme online harassment from a former colleague. At the same time, we had begun to lose a family member to video games, and we both began to struggle with questions surrounding our work-life balance. In short, we were lost. The Camino began for us a last-ditch effort to save ourselves and along The Way of St. James, we found the way forward. This is likely the reason that 6 months later we were back on the Via Podiensis / GR65 in France and shortly after that on the Camino Portuguese and the Camino Finisterre . Hiking and being outdoors can be wonderfully addictive. Like Many people who are inspired by the Camino or who have trekked some part of one of the routes to Santiago (and been hooked ...