caminoforme86
Active Member
- Time of past OR future Camino
- Camino Frances October 2013 - December 2013
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You do not need to be in great shape to successfully walk the entire camino. But you do need to use the first couple of weeks as physical training. You would not go to the gym for the first time and do exhaustion reps all day. You would phase it in. Ditto the camino. Do not try to walk the published stages, and do not try to keep up with pilgrims you meet. If you overdo it, your pilgrimage can end very abruptly.
At the end of October you will not have a problem finding beds anywhere, so do not worry about SJPdP. I think L'Esprit du Chemin closes about then, but there are other albergues and hotels. The Pilgrim Office will help you find one.
If your pack is light, there is nothing to worry about. Toss out everything that you might need, and keep only the items you know you will use every day (except rain gear, which you are likely, but not certain, to need).
You won't be lonely. There will be dozens of other pilgrims each day. You can be alone if you want, though.
Avoid having mental images of what your camino should be. They are far too likely to lead to disappointment, or cause you to do something you should not do.
Buen camino. There is nothing to worry about. Use the nervous energy instead to learn all you can about where you are going.
I'm leaving Sept 3rd from San Francisco. I'm also a bit nervous, but it's tempered by the excitement of the adventure. I haven't really prepared for this trip. I have only walked a couple of miles a week. However, I bike about 100 miles a week, so I think I'll be okay. I think you'll be fine if you go, as many say, at your own pace. Now that I have bought my plane tickets, reserved a room in Madrid near the airport, perused the bus schedules to Pamplona, and made reservations at the Aloha Hostel I feel more at ease. Buen Camino...Felipe from CaliforniaI as well am leaving this week Sept 2 and am becoming nervous.Due to family issues I have been unable to walk the past 2 weeks and am nervouse this will work against me!!!!
I as well am leaving this week Sept 2 and am becoming nervous.Due to family issues I have been unable to walk the past 2 weeks and am nervouse this will work against me!!!!
...Worrying about my pack, loneliness, if I will mentally be fit enough and not let worries about who I am leaving at home creep in...
I was in no way prepared for the Pyrenees. No way. Not ever. I'm 50, unfit and unwell. My daughter, Georgia is 10. We did it, but I have to tell you I was cranky as all hell at this forum I'd been reading avidly for 3 years prior to my journey and never once did I hear someone say "Damn that's hard". I heard the elation after the conquering, but nothing near the sheer terror I actually felt after 6 hours, fading daylight, nowhere near enough water ("agua non-potable"), 14 Koreans airlifted to safety and a Brazillian killed getting lost in the snow. And ... yes... a ridiculous idea that 'we'll be right because 60 year olds do it!!!" Well, yes they do.... but I have a funny feeling they walk a whole heap more regularly than I do.
Having said that. I am phlegmatically lazy, and I really should have exercised more; I was a smoker (thank you Cruz de Ferro); and as a flatlander from Australia, I had no idea what a mountain actually looked like. I joined the elated chorus when we conquered the mountain, but I did have moments (lots of them) when, because I had my daughter with me, I had to ask myself if I had done something very, very stupid indeed.
When we were done in - and I'm serious about this, I was scared; I grabbed Georgia when she just couldn't walk another step, and said "I'm sooooo sorry, I had no idea it would be this hard. I wish I could take it all away and make this simple, but the truth is we can't go back; we can't stay here (snow everywhere by this altitude); and we can't phone for help... we HAVE to keep going up." and bless her cotton socks, she did keep going. When we saw the chapel on the top of that bloody big hill, I don't know where it had come from, but Georgia RAN past me to it - and straight over to keep going!! knowing she was close to 'there'. What a lesson that was!!!! It is not the mountain that we conquer - but ourselves!!!
After that, really.... it was a walk in the park.
I am doing the Camino from 31st October this year......I booked my flights to start the Camino at the end of July and since then I've not really thought about it, I was walking 8.5km a day intending to incraese that to 17km and then stepping it up to 25km a day. But things got side tracked as I had a birthday trip to Bratislava and Budapest.
Still havn't got back into the walking, intend to start of slow again tomorrow with doing the 8.5km for the remainder of this week and next week doing 17km a day.
But I sometimes wake in a panic not really able to believe that I will do this, my want to do it is so strong I just dont know how I will do it!
I am worried about things like not having my first 2 nights booked in St Jean Pied de Port, and if I don't have anything booked will it be so expensive those first 2 nights. I want to stay 2 as I arrive on the last train and want to make the Pilgrim office.
Worrying about my pack, loneliness, if I will mentally be fit enough and not let worries about who I am leaving at home creep in.
Guess its hitting home that next week when its September I can say I am doing the Camino NEXT MONTH....
sorry about the looooong delay in responding: March this yearReg, what month did you walk over the mountains?
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