Our Virtual Camino: Arrival in “Santiago”

Yesterday my beautiful bride Francine and I finished walking our virtual Camino from Lourdes to Santiago, a distance of roughly 957km. You’ve heard of staycations? This was a staymino. It took us just over a year. At least I got one thing accomplished during lockdown!

We mostly walked around our neighbourhood parks, but there were the occasional urban expeditions, including one where we discovered that our favourite hamburger joint was only 3km away. There and back was a solid mid-day walk, with a lunch in the middle! Because of the Plague, we had to eat in a nearby park, but that somehow made it even better.

Clearly, we weren’t walking full Camino days of 20 – 25km each day. We started out with 3km daily walks first thing in the morning and quickly graduated to 5km walks. By the end, our normal morning walk was 8km – about 5 miles they tell me. Our final push to Santiago was a 13km walk at the Tacoma waterfront and around Point Defiance Park and back.

It was fun keeping track of our progress.

We mostly walked five or six days a week, though there were some weeks where we didn’t walk at all. The kilometers only counted when we were walking together, and Francine went on some hikes with her friend Callie. There was a week I was out of town, and a couple of weeks where Francine was out of town.

Nevertheless, we always returned to it. And it wasn’t just walking for the sake of walking – although that would certainly have been a sufficient reason to do this.

We tested gear as we went along, including shoes, poles, clothing, packs. During the course of our walk, Francine converted me into a trekking pole fan.

And yesterday, after the final push of a half-Camino day, we finished. We will probably extend this another week or so as we walk to virtual Finisterre and Muxía, but that’s just icing on the cake.

And today, what should arrive in the mail but our pilgrim passports for our next proper Camino in France and Spain. We’re planning for Spring 2022, but we’re also keeping our eye on the possibility of going this Autumn. We shall see!