local camino clubs

[AntAthOBuaidhe]

A couple of students in the college where I work are interested in founding a Camino Club. The idea is not to organise pilgrimages to the Camino, but to provide members with information, shared experience and fellowship to help make their own Caminos more enjoyable and possibly less painful.

Does anyone have any experience of such clubs or societies? I'd be delighted to know what you do and how you do it.

Seán

 

[Silverton]

An tAthair,

This sounds like a good idea, if you want something younger and more local than the Irish Society of Friends of St James (www.stjamesirl.com), which is a very good source of information and occasional get-togethers in Ireland. Surely interested students can just meet informally and a club may grow out of it. Cjhubbs 'of this parish' might join as an international member!
You may be able to get some feedback from members of the SVdeP society at TCD, who have done charity-walks on the Camino in recent years.
('less painful'? I don't think the Camino is painful, or penitential, for many of us.)

Slán leat.

 

[AntAthOBuaidhe]

That's basically the idea: get them meeting together locally and see what it becomes. If there were any existing clubs, however, I'd be interested to know how they function and what activities members have found most useful/useless.

Apart from evenings of sharing pilgrim experiences (of which we have many already) we are considering having regular meetings based around hiking first aid, fitness, hill-walking know-how, camino culture, and possibly language(s).

We'll see how it all goes!