Camino del Norte in August

[katja]

Hi all
I'm planning on doing part of the Camino del Norte starting in mid-August from Oviedo / Gijon and would appreciate any advice on distances and accommodation in particular. As my fellow pilgrim is recovering from back problems, we will be looking to do around 20km a day and I'm a bit concerned that accommodation won't be as easy to come by as it was on the Camino Frances last August.

Many thanks in advance!
Katja

 

[Ange]

Hi Katya,
This is Ange. I am also walking the Camino Primitivo from Oviedo (note not the Camino del Norte for this stage) in July with some French friends. It helps that I speak English and one of us speaks Spanish so we have been able to research all the camino sites in all three languages which helps a lot. I have already written about the possibility of taking little tents and from the lack of response it seems its down to me to research for ourselves. I will be ringing up and emailing the albergue hospitaleros, and the village ayuntamientos to ask if we can place small tents near the albergues and use their facilities. When I have the information I will post it on the site. In the meantime, for your own research, try the following site -caminodesantiago. Although it is in spanish, you can work it out - there are profiles and maps along with pictures of the albergues. Someone else on the forum posted this great site for the maps and profiles. So if you want to have details and profiles go to the mundicamino site and use the brit flag, and The Primitive Way, then line/outline. The routes are described on spanish version but not english, so if there isn't enough information flip back to the spanish and use google language tools. These two sites should help. The caminodesantiago site prints in black for some reason.
Buen Camino, Ange
http://caminodesantiago.consumer.es/eta ... do-a-grado
http://www.mundicamino.com/

 

[Josefine]

Hi Ange, I'll be walking the Primitivo in August and have been looking into the accomodation alternatives. I found this page,
http://www.vivirasturias.com/dondedormi ... ergues/es- In the green list to the right you can find "campings Asturia". Hope it helps and and please share your experience. Are you planning to walk the Hospitales route?
Josefine

 

[Ange]

Hi Josefine,
I already checked this site out and the campsites are all towards the Camino Norte, not the Primitivo. The proper holiday camp sites near the bigger towns like Oviedo charge quite a lot per night to place a tent. I also found out that in Summer they want you to book for a week.Even out of season they ask for two days. This could be to prevent pilgrims using them as a overnighter? I have sent emails to as many addresses as I could find for the Albergues and Ayuntamientos. If any of them reply positively I will post the info. After the torrential rain in France and Spain the weather has suddenly turned very hot. I hope the Primitivo will be just that bit cooler due to the slightly higher altitude. Two weeks to go. The Hospitales route - we havent discussed this yet, some of the reports seem a bit scary. I am just looking forward to setting off, enjoying the walk, the challenge and difficulties it might bring, and discovering who I am in the process. Maybe a sleeping bag under the stars isnt so bad? Ange

 

[jl]

Don't be scared of the Hospitales route Ange - it is quite doable. I did it on my own last year (although I knew there were quite a few people behind me) and had no difficulties. I also had no difficulties with accomodation in the refugios but it was September by the time I got there. Cheers, Janet