Posting Walking Poles Home

[GailGwyn]

My husband and I plan to walk the Frances in May 2022. On our previous Caminos we've either checked our poles into the hold of the plane, or bought cheap poles and donated them at the end of the Camino.

This time, we're travelling to France (from the UK), by train. However, we plan to fly back to the UK, from Santiago. Could anyone advise what's involved and a cost estimate for posting 2 sets of walking Poles home, using Correos?

Thanks very much.

 

[Tincatinker]

Historically the airlines operating out of Santiago–Rosalía de Castro Airport have allowed free checking of poles if suitably packaged. Which may solve the issue for you. I can't speak to current costs but postage on the last package I sent (2018?) from the Correos inside the Pilgrims Office to the UK was less than €20. You'll need to find some suitable packaging. We bought ours from the Correos for less than €10.

You might find the answer to your question here: https://www.correos.es/es/en/individuals/send

 

[Annette london]

Tincatinker is correct
just take your walking poles to the desk of any airline, easyJe/Ryanair and they will transport the poles in the hold for free
we always use “a walking pole cloth bag” …costs about £5 from Millets and with a push will hold 2 sets.

 

[nidarosa]

I have always sent my Pacerpoles from the UK to my first booked accommodation and it usually cost around £12 and took about a week, so I could take my pack as carry-on. However, after brexit, it cost me £14 to send them tracked, with a customs declaration which has no box to tick for sending your own property to yourself in a different place; it took nearly 3 weeks for them to arrive in Spain, and when they did, they were not delivered to the hotel but I received a card to go and collect them at the main post office - which means making sure you have time to go when they are open, which they aren't at weekends, for instance - and pay another €18! So make sure you know what is involved - cost, time and hassle - when trying to send things to and from the UK now, and after the new year there will/might be even more red tape involved as the full brexit customs rules kick in. Forewarned is forearmed etc.

I understand (and hope) the OP might be able to take them for free from Santiago airport but I have never taken that chance. For my next trip I will be putting my poles in the backpack and paying for it to go in the hold, then at least I have them with me and don't risk having to wait around for them to be delivered.

 

[PilgrimPillar]

My husband and I plan to walk the Frances in May 2022. On our previous Caminos we've either checked our poles into the hold of the plane, or bought cheap poles and donated them at the end of the Camino.

This time, we're travelling to France (from the UK), by train. However, we plan to fly back to the UK, from Santiago. Could anyone advise what's involved and a cost estimate for posting 2 sets of walking Poles home, using Correos?

Thanks very much.

As a future investment for you guys ; my strategy of choice is Black diamond Carbon poles. No worries anymore and security check is doable for onboard luggage.

I bought them online through Decathlon and pick up locally/Sevilla for just over 100 euro……cost divided for years to come and veeeery lightweight

 

[nidarosa]

security check is doable for onboard luggage

On which airlines or from which airports? Walking/hiking poles are still widely considered not permissable on board because of the metal tip which means they can be classed as weapons. Folding the poles up does not change that and in most cases it depends on the person at security. My Pacerpoles were completely dismantled in my pack and when I asked at Porto airport just out of interest, they would not have gone through in the pack as hand luggage.

 

[Kathar1na]

Fact, nothing but fact about poles at the Santiago de Compostela airport: They don't want you to take your poles with you into the cabin!!! When I was there in 2019, I made a point of looking and asking. There were posters at the checkin desks and on a notice board just before entering the security area and a further poster on the glass door right in front of your nose before you enter the security area that tell you so. There is nothing that indicates that you benefit from an exemption from their wishes should you manage to fold up your walking poles and put them into your backpack or depending on whether they are made of a particular material, or whether you consider poles to be sharp instruments to put into someone's skin or flesh or blunt instruments to hit someone over the head. Forget what you think you know or believe about poles, airports, TSA lists, or EU law. At Santiago airport, they don't want you to bring them into the cabin, fullstop.

Every airline operating departing flights out of Santiago de Compostela airport will check in your poles for free. That is every airline including budget airlines such as Ryanair. That is for every ticket, including the cheapest budget ticket from Iberia or AerLingus.

You can check in your poles for free when departing from Santiago de Compostela airport.

In case you are wondering why this is not more widely known, not publicised or why people doubt it ... I don't know the answer.

PS: During my survey in 2019, I also established that there is a guy at SdC airport who will wrap up your poles or other luggage with this bubble stuff and there is a small shopping space right next to the entry to the security area where Correos (I think) sells tubes and other wrapping material for your walking poles.

 

[Kathar1na]

However, after brexit, it cost me £14 to send them tracked, with a customs declaration which has no box to tick for sending your own property to yourself in a different place

Having done this several times this year, I can confirm this.

For every parcel, small or big, that you send from an EU country to the UK, you will have to fill in the green customs declaration form. You need to indicate the weight and the value of the goods you want to send. You need to indicate whether it is a gift, a document, a commercial sample, returned goods, or "other". Your parcel may or may not be held up at customs in the UK. Most of my parcels arrived reasonably quickly in 2021 but one was delayed by more than two weeks. All the goods I sent where of low value and the recipient did not have to pay duty. I do not know under which circumstances duty has to by paid by a recipient in the UK.

 

[Flog]

On every camino I find a stick on my first day or two and make it my own using a cheap knife, cord, beads etc.

Some I have given away but mostly I take them home with me and I have a few now. I just hobble up to the airport desk leaning heavily on it and insist I'll need it when I get off at the other end. They put a tag on it and it goes in the hold for free. Have done it six or seven times now from different cities: SdC, Bilbao, Porto etc. I'm prepared to be refused, it would be no big deal, but it hasn't failed me yet..

 

[nidarosa]

Every airline operating departing flights out of Santiago de Compostela airport will check in your poles for free.

That is good to know! If you are travelling on though, remember that you have to check in your poles again for the next leg of the journey and it will be cheaper to pre-book that than having to pay at the airport.

Could anyone advise what's involved and a cost estimate for posting 2 sets of walking Poles home, using Correos?

If you send the poles back from Spain, you will probably have to pay again when they get to the UK - I had to pay a steep fee to get my Christmas parcel from my mother in Norway delivered to my address in the UK, and assume the same goes for things you send to yourself from abroad. But I'd check with a knowledgeable post office staff here before you decide what to do. And again, there will be new rules coming into force after the new year so ask specifically about that.

 

[Kathar1na]

If you send the poles back from Spain, you will probably have to pay again when they get to the UK - I had to pay a steep fee to get my Christmas parcel from my mother in Norway delivered to my address in the UK, and assume the same goes for things you send to yourself from abroad. But I'd check with a knowledgeable post office staff here before you decide what to do. And again, there will be new rules coming into force after the new year so ask specifically about that.

Just bear in mind that staff at a Spanish Post Office will not know when / if / how much VAT, duty or delivery charges will have to be paid by the recipient in the UK. Here is a link to a gov.uk website: https://www.gov.uk/goods-sent-from-abroad/tax-and-duty

My guesses are: That it will be a bit hit and miss when both the EU sender and the UK recipient are private individuals; much will depend on what you indicate as value on the green customs declaration form; I personally regard things that I already own and that I send to myself and that are not newly bought as essentially without value; nearly everything that I send to family members or friends is declared as a gift worth less than €20 (optionally: less than £39 - note relevant information on the gov.uk website).

Difficult to say what postage for a parcel of the size and weight of two or four pacer poles will cost for sending from the Spain to the UK. Probably not the world but certainly more than free checked luggage.

 

[Flog]

My husband and I plan to walk the Frances in May 2022. On our previous Caminos we've either checked our poles into the hold of the plane, or bought cheap poles and donated them at the end of the Camino.

This time, we're travelling to France (from the UK), by train. However, we plan to fly back to the UK, from Santiago. Could anyone advise what's involved and a cost estimate for posting 2 sets of walking Poles home, using Correos?

Thanks very much.

I'm not sure I understand your question. What is preventing you from checking them in as opposed to posting them this time??

 

[nidarosa]

It would probably have been cheaper to send them than check them in, but sadly not anymore.

 

[Rick of Rick and Peg]

To avoid paying customs on entry home for something that left home with you see if something like this is available. About 40 years ago I left on an overseas trip from the US with a Japanese made camera. Before leaving I filled out a government form that indicated that I already owned the camera and that no duty was required when I came back. The camera came back with me but I don't think there would have been a problem if I picked it up at a post office either. That was the only time I ever did that.

 

[GailGwyn]

I'm not sure I understand your question. What is preventing you from checking them in as opposed to posting them this time??

Nothing to prevent us checking them. Just wanted to ask if anyone had experience of either/both, so we could make a decision.

Never flown directly to the UK, from Santiago before, so again, thought we'd ask for others' experiences.

 

[GailGwyn]

Thanks everyone. Some very helpful information here.

Think our best option will be to check them in at Santiago Airport. Great to know that they do it for free!

 

[Kathar1na]

I'm not sure I understand your question. What is preventing you from checking them in as opposed to posting them this time??

I guess that many people, especially from further afield, have plane tickets that include checked baggage of 20 kg or so. They can either check the poles on their own, or check their backpack with folded-up poles, without further ado and without additional payment.

People from Europe often have cheap plane tickets without an allowance for checked baggage. If they want to take their poles with them back home after all and leave by plane from Spain and do so from Santiago airport where poles are explicitly not allowed in the cabin they will either have to mail them (against payment) or check them (free only when departing from Santiago and against payment when departing from say Madrid). I am not sure that there is much difference in price between mailing them and checking them. Probably more a question of convenience, organisation and preference than price difference.

However, and here we are entering the exciting area of personally lived anecdotes and personally read texts on websites: leaving from Madrid opens the option of keeping them close to you all the time ...

 

[Flog]

However, and here we are entering the exciting area of personally lived anecdotes and personally read texts on websites

Indeed. Someone asks a question, someone shares their experience, someone invariably questions it. The nature of the internet forum.

 

[David Tallan]

Tincatinker is correct
just take your walking poles to the desk of any airline, easyJe/Ryanair and they will transport the poles in the hold for free
we always use “a walking pole cloth bag” …costs about £5 from Millets and with a push will hold 2 sets.

This wasn't our experience after our 2016 Camino, where we were charged a hefty fee to put our poles in the hold, which we were willing to pay because by that point we had developed an emotional attachment to them. For my next Camino, in 2018, I bought them after arrival and posted them home.

 

[Kathar1na]

This wasn't our experience after our 2016 Camino, where we were charged a hefty fee to put our poles in the hold

But this didn't not happen at Santiago airport, did it?

When @Tincatinker and @Annette london advised to "just take your walking poles to the desk of any airline, EasyJet/Ryanair and they will transport the poles in the hold for free", they were referring to the desk of any airline at Santiago airport. Not at any other airport. It is important to be aware of this distinction.

I see that you wrote in an earlier thread:

I used BlaBla Car after my 2016 Camino to get from SdC to Madrid.

 

[David Tallan]

But this didn't not happen at Santiago airport, did it?

When @Tincatinker and @Annette london advised to "just take your walking poles to the desk of any airline, EasyJet/Ryanair and they will transport the poles in the hold for free", they were referring to the desk of any airline at Santiago airport. Not at any other airport. It is important to be aware of this distinction.

Aah. That wasn't clear to me. As it happens, I haven't flown out of the Santiago airport after any of my three Caminos. So I wouldn't presume everyone does.

 

[Flog]

I was allowed to put a walking stick (not a pair of tipped hiking poles) through free of charge at SdC, Bilbao (Aer Lingus) and at Porto (Ryannair). I think maybe Santander too, I can't remember for sure. I know it is actual airport policy at SdC, I don't think it is at the others, but I'm a chancer and sometimes I just get away with things..

 

[Flog]

These are typical ones of mine...

 

[Joe C]

On every camino I find a stick on my first day or two and make it my own using a cheap knife, cord, beads etc.

Of course, then there is the problem of the knife...

 

[Flog]

Of course, then there is the problem of the knife...

It's not a problem for me. I buy a cheap knife from the first oriental bazaar I find and it does me for the whole camino, for whittling stick, peeling fruit, cutting tomatoes etc. It goes into the kitchen drawer of the last albergue with the hundred others that pilgrims can't take home!