The Magical Number Thirty-Three, Plus or Minus Three

[Iuri Colares]

How long does it take to walk the entire Camino Francés, from St. Jean Pied de Port to Santiago de Compostela?

John Brierley’s sense is that most people take 4 weeks. He describes a pace that will allow you to reach Santiago gracefully in 5 weeks — 35 days with 2 rest days. He likes the idea that he walks one day for every year that Christ lived on earth. Paco Nadal’s guide is divided in 30 stages. Antón Pombo’s guide is divided in 34 stages. The map distributed by the Association Les Amis du Chemin de Saint-Jacques - Pyrénées Atlantiques shows 34 stages. Carlos Mencos’s Buen Camino app suggests 32 stages. I plan to arrive at SJPdP in the evening of September 23 and walk my pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Thirty-Three Days, Plus or Minus Three. I will celebrate my 50th birthday on October 28.

Thanks for your advice!

This depends on many factors such as level of fitness, weather, detours, motivation, time constraints, rest days, strains and sprains.

 

[trecile]

I walked my first Camino from St Jean to Finisterre in 35 days with no previous backpacking experience. And I had almost a decade on you.

 

[lissie45]

How long do you want it to take? I asked the same question - and then did some trial walking. I rapidly concluded that I will be unlikely to walk 25 km and am never walking 30km - so I'm thinking more like 15km day. Plus I want extra days - definitely want to spend some time in Pamplona, Leon and Burgos - but I suspect other places will come up too. My current thinking is that Pamplona to Santiago will probably take us about 6 weeks - but I'm going to book the flights to Europe 10 weeks apart to allow for variations and maybe walking to Finisterra and going back and walking the Pyranees once we're fit.

 

[Mark T17]

The Camino will tell you how long it will take you after about a week or two. Celebrating your birthday in Santiago sounds like a goal! Good luck !

 

[Hobbyhorse]

My boot-camp-fit husband and this less athletic wife (both early 60’s at the time) spent 45 days walking the 800 km from SJPdP to Santiago. Two years later we spent 30 days walking 560km from Granon to Santiago. We were turtles, not rabbits. Sometimes we did over 30 km/day, sometimes a ‘rest day’ was as low as 5km. We generally didn’t tie ourselves down with reservations or ship our packs, so we could listen to our bodies and stop when it felt right. Once in beautiful Santiago we cancelled plans to vacation at the beach and benefited from several days easing through ‘re-entry’ in the company of other pilgrims.

We used (and are quite keen on) John Brierley’s book. However, we saw many people, especially very fit young people, who confidently walked to its pace but then injured more than their pride. Once that happened they could only get back on schedule by being forced to bus when they hadn’t really wanted to. Despite the book’s format, I wonder, did the author really want us to walk the high daily mileage derived from the 33 stages he sets out? He entices us with enjoyable optional paths and special-moment stops that just don’t fit that. I developed a joking, completely fictional personal theory about why his book sets out 33 stages when his heart-felt theme seems to encourage more mindfulness and less speed. Here's an imaginary conversation:

John to publisher: “The draft of my first Camino Frances edition is ready. I’m so excited to share it, to support Camino pilgrimage. I organized it around 40 stages, like Christ’s forty days in the wilderness!”

Publisher to John: “Forty days? Plus travel time to and from Spain & the odd rest day? Who gets that much time off work? I get the internal journey and all that, but if you want me to print it we’ve got to sell enough to pay the bills. Don’t scare customers away. Can you get it down to 33? Seems to me that’s in the Bible somewhere ...”

... I say that in humour, and with apologies to John Brierley and the publisher. He has done lots of good through his book which, read carefully (sometimes delightfully between the lines), offers wisdom and very useful logistics.

 

[KinkyOne]

You just make your own stages if the time permits and don't rely on any of the suggested stages. After all you don't know a lot of things that can happen on the way. Like your mood, weather, health, company etc.

Because I'm always on a budget I do make a plan on paper but then I search for return flights as cheap as possible within 7-10 days after planned finish. I never ever made mistake with this approach. You just don't know what will happen along the way.

Buen Camino!

 

[John Hungerford]

We used the Brierley book in 2009. It never occurred to us that a page of the book was a stage. We just stopped (mostly) where there was a choice of albergues. We took 50 days - which included 3 rest days - meaning we enjoyed the Camino experience for longer than most - lucky us. The most we walked in a day was 25 kms but we had 3 days of only 5 kms. Just suit yourself. Buen camino.

 

[Jim]

We used the Brierley book in 2009. It never occurred to us that a page of the book was a stage. We just stopped (mostly) where there was a choice of albergues. We took 50 days - which included 3 rest days - meaning we enjoyed the Camino experience for longer than most - lucky us. The most we walked in a day was 25 kms but we had 3 days of only 5 kms. Just suit yourself. Buen camino.

I did something similar when walking from SJPDP-- leisurely 45 days including 2 rest stops to treat myself to a massage and a haircut. Smelling the flowers along the way was more important than racing ahead. For those lacking that sort of time, I suggest walking through the first half of the camino and planning a second journey the following year.

 

[MikeOK]

The amount of km people can walk every day is of course dependent on numerous of personal factors such as age, weight, life-style, injuries etc and time of year.

However, opposite a lot of the users here I feel Brierly and other authors has played it very safe in their recommendations regarding the km of each stage. They have very likely looked at their target audience (+seniors) and aimed to give the readers something almost everybody would be able to complete without many issues or high risk of injuries. With the increasing amount of younger people walking the CF every year I’m surprised that books with longer stages haven’t surged unto the scene. I personally feel an average of around 30km per day (~26 days not included rest days) should be well within most people’s reach and still leave plenty of time to stop and smell the roses. I personally walked to Santiago in 21 days and didn’t feel I was part of a race or that I didn’t have time to stop and explorer whenever I wanted too. IMO there is really no point arriving at the albergue around noon/mid-day, when you can spend more hours walking and experience the magic on camino.

The most important thing though is to walk your own camino = the hours and km per day that suits you. And as somebody said, you dont have to follow the book to the point.