EPISODE 15
Los Caminos de Santiago
With seven Caminos de Santiago by bicycle under his belt and an eighth one in preparation, Frank Foulon is uniquely equipped to inform us about this remarkable pilgrimage route that has been ongoing, with wild fluctuations in participation, since the ninth century. Frank discusses the historical background and cultural significance of the Camino, including recent changes as a result of the Camino’s rise in popularity. He also details the different routes in Europe that converge to form the Camino Francés, from the Pyrenees to Santiago de Compostela, as well as other historical starting points on the Iberian Peninsula (the Camino Portugués, the Vía de la Plata, and the Camino Primitivo). Additionally, Frank volunteered for several years as an hospitalero in the town of Los Arcos, where he welcomed, assisted, and encouraged thousands of pilgrims.
Episode Transcript
Frank: We started by saying that, especially for the veterans like we, we’ve known another time, twenty, twenty-five years ago, it was much more of an adventurous Camino. You felt like a real guest in Spain and not like a tourist. All this has gone a bit, that’s true. It’s unavoidable. It’s the success of the Camino, but still it’s very, very worth doing it. Please do it while you can. It’s a must.
Gabriel: You just heard Frank Foulon, describing his enthusiasm for the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. Frank is indeed a veteran, having cycled seven Caminos since 2004 and preparing for his eighth in 2024. Frank also volunteered for three terms of several weeks as an hospitalero in the town of Los Arcos, where he welcomed, assisted, and encouraged thousands of pilgrims. Additionally, Frank is an expert in the historical background and cultural significance of the Camino. I am thrilled to welcome him as a guest today.
Sandra: You’re listening to the Accidental Bicycle Tourist. In this podcast, you’ll meet people from all walks of life and learn about their most memorable bike touring experiences. This is your host Gabriel Aldaz.
Gabriel: Hello cycle touring enthusiasts! Welcome to another episode of the Accidental Bicycle Tourist. This episode is being published on a special day: Thursday, July 25th, bring you an entire episode about the Camino de Santiago, which has been mentioned in three previous episodes. Our guide to the Camino will be Frank Foulon, a Belgian man who is here today thanks to Kris Vlaeminck, our guest on the episode, “Hospitality on the Road.” Frank, how is it that you know Kris?
Frank: Kris Vlaeminck is a former colleague of mine. We worked together for like 15 years in Brussels, so that’s where I learned to know him. We were both working at the IT department and, actually, I think it’s during lunch times that we get to know one another and that we discovered that we had the same passion, which is cycling.
Gabriel: Yeah.
Frank: Not just cycling, speeding, but traveling with the bike, doing long-distance travels with a bike, packed with everything. We said, “Well why not try to do some tours together? And we started with one-day tours in and around Brussels and the south of Belgium, and then I think by now we must have done something like four, five longer tours mostly in Spain.
Gabriel: Okay, so you worked together and then you discovered you had this passion.
Frank: We no longer work together. I changed jobs seven years ago. I’m working in a not-for-profit organization, an NGO. I’m working mainly on Africa now.
Gabriel: You say Africa. what exactly does the NGO do?
Frank: We are an NGO focused on supporting private entrepreneurship in eight African countries, and we do so by giving technical advice and sending volunteers working in technical things like IT, machinery, electronics, things like that. Our ambition, our goal, is to help these companies grow and create jobs and we do so with subsidies we receive from the Flemish government.
Gabriel: In which countries are you present?
Frank: So we are active in South Africa, Mozambique, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Ghana, and Morocco. So we are 20 people on the payroll, if I can call it like that, but most of the activity is done of course by technical volunteers. So people who spend their holidays in supporting these companies in the south.
Gabriel: It’s interesting that the former Belgian colony of Congo is not one of the ones where you’re active.
Frank: Correct, and actually it’s to do also with the language, because most of the technical people we have, they are more at ease working in English than in French.
Gabriel: Of course, That makes sense. Well, it sounds like a very interesting organization. And what is the name of it?
Frank: It’s called Exchange. The Exchange of Technical Expertise, actually. That was the original name and now it’s shortened to Exchange.
Gabriel: okay I can see why you’d want to shorten that.
Frank: Kris has been a volunteer also already. He went with us on a technical mission to Ethiopia.
Gabriel: Oh, very interesting. I didn’t know that.
Frank: Well, without our bicycles of course.
Gabriel: Well, speaking of bicycles, that’s what we’re here to talk about. So the way that Kris introduced you was as an expert on the Camino de Santiago.
Frank: That’s correct.
Gabriel: It’s a topic that’s come up several times in previous episodes, as you might imagine.
Frank: Yeah.
Gabriel: And I’ve always been dreaming about doing a whole episode focusing on the Camino, or in this case, maybe more accurately, Caminos with an S de Santiago, because there’s so much to talk about, and Kris said well I know the right person for you. So, Frank, thank you for being a guest on the Accidental Bicycle Tourist podcast.
Frank: Thank you. Thank you for inviting me.
Gabriel: Let’s get started. For those people who may not know that much about the Camino – by now I think everybody has heard about it at some level – can you give a brief introduction about what is the Camino historically and what makes it so special?
Frank: It all started in the first century, yes. For people knowing Christianity, there is what we call Pentecost. Pentecost is the moment where the twelve, or the eleven remaining apostles, get sent to preach and to share the good news. The Evangelium, the good news. So there’s one of the apostles, called James the Elder, and he is sent by the Holy Ghost to go and preach in northern Spain, in what was at that time Galicia (Celtic region) and Basque country. He gets off and moves from Jerusalem to northern Spain to go and preach. Different from his colleagues in Egypt, in Rome, he’s not very successful and he’s said to have gone back already to Jerusalem after a few years of, I would say, attempts without success. But then, when he’s martyred in Jerusalem in 48, his body miraculously, or maybe it’s a myth, his body disappears from Jerusalem and is found back in northern Spain in the beginning of the ninth century, around the year 812. So in Santiago, at that time still called Lupuria, a tomb is discovered, and the body in it is identified as Saint James. And from that discovery on, so early ninth century, a pilgrimage to the grave of the Holy Apostle starts, and it’s very much linked to the Reconquista, because in the eighth century, in the early eighth century, Spain is invaded by the Moors and is occupied, almost all of it, except for the very northern part the coast of what is now Asturias and Galicia. The discovery of the tomb is seen as a sign from God that it’s time now to reconquer and to reinstate Christianity in the Iberian Peninsula, and that way Saint James and his tomb in Santiago de Compostela, in Lupuria at the time, is kind of the focal point where the motivation for the Reconquista comes from. The Reconquista is only completed, as we know, in end of the 15th century, in 1492. For seven centuries Santiago is the I would say the patron saint of the Reconquista.
Gabriel: Most people associate Santiago, of course, as a saint and a religious figure, but it’s interesting what you are saying about this connection to the Reconquista, the retaking of Spain from the Moors. In Spain, there’s also this dual figure of Santiago Matamoros, which is, like, Santiago the Slayer of Moors, so to speak, and that has much more of a military and heroic side to it that I think most people may not be aware of.
Frank: That’s correct and very true, and actually I’ve even seen in the last 20 years a change in focus. In the cathedral, there is still the statue, a very big statue, of Santiago Matamoros, and on my first Camino in 2004 that statue was still exhibited in the cathedral, I would say, fully. At the feet of the horse of Santiago de Compostela was the slain Moors. If you go to the cathedral now, you will still see the statue, but you will not be able to see anymore the Moors at the feet of the horse. They are covered and they are hidden.
Gabriel: Interesting.
Frank: Yeah, and it’s to do also with Franco. For Franco, Santiago de Compostela, Matamoros, was also the patron of his fascist army. There is a political connotation also, so Santiago de Compostela had no other choice than to opt for a much more religious focus in the last two decades, and they get rid of this connotation with Moor-slaying and with the Franquist army.
Gabriel: Santiago is the patron saint of Spain, and so you can see how easily political figures try to embrace that patron saint as a symbol for whatever caused they’re espousing.
Frank: From the first battle of the Reconquista, which is, I think 841 in Clavijo, Santiago de Compostela was already associated with it. This first battle, which was a small victory for the Christian armies, is due to Santiago, who would have fought himself, on his white horse, in that battle.
Gabriel: Good. Let’s get back then to the historical outline.
Frank: A pilgrimage from the other European countries starts gradually from the 9th century to go and visit the tomb of Santiago. I would say from the tenth, eleventh century on, it’s one of the major religious pilgrimages possible, because at that time already the road to Jerusalem is no longer open. It will be reopened by the Crusades later. Santiago de Compostela to some extent is the easiest – between brackets – the easiest way to go and reach a shrine of Christianity. Tenth century, eleventh century, we see an enormous growth in a number of pilgrims reaching Santiago de Compostela, all by foot. Like 95% by foot and then maybe a few by horse. It’s become a highway for christianity in northern Spain. Of course, the city benefits from it, and one church after another is built in Santiago de Compostela, while the church on top of the tomb of the holy apostle is always enlarged. Twice it’s being conquered and burned by the Muslims in a counterattack. Every time it comes out bigger, to end in the twelvth century with the Roman cathedral, which is still in place.
Gabriel: You were saying that in those Middle Ages, the vast majority of the pilgrims were going by foot, and maybe a few by horseback. They would be following mostly the route from France?
Frank: Yes. In current France we, identify four historical routes, and they all have Latin names. The first one was actually for the pilgrims from what is now the Benelux (the Low Countries) and northern France, and the English, of course, which participated very much in the Camino until the sixteenth century, as you know.
Gabriel: The event Frank is referring to was the English Reformation, when King Henry VIII forced the Church of England to break with the pope and the Catholic Church. Indeed, the establishment of Protestantism across northern Europe in the sixteenth century greatly diminished the number of pilgrims reaching Santiago. In the eighteenth century, the Enlightenment fostered a religious skepticism that further reduced the flow of pilgrims to a trickle. The support network for pilgrims collapsed, as the Camino fell into disuse and disrepair. The revival began only in the 1980s. In 1985, the number of pilgrims reaching Santiago de Compostela was 690. In 2024, 690 pilgrims will arrive to the city every 12 hours.
Frank: This route, which is called the Vía Turonensis, passes by Tours in France, on the Loire. Tours was kind of the gathering point. People from all different routes went south to Tours. From Tours on, they grouped themselves to continue to Santiago de Compostela, and that Vía Turonensis passes by Bordeaux and Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, up to Roncesvalles and then the Camino Francés to Santiago de Compostela. That’s the first historical route. The second one, which is more for, I would say, lower Germany and Luxembourg, east of France, is what we call the Vía Lemovicensis, and it starts in Vézelay. So, Vézelay is also the place where the First Crusade was preached in 1095. It’s the tomb of Maria Magdalena, also in Vézelay. People again gathered there and from there on through Vézelay, Limoges, they also reached the Pyrenees on their way to Santiago de Compostela. The third one, which is the most original one, is the Vía Podiensis, and the Vía Podiensis starts in Le Puy, and Le Puy is considered to have been the starting point of the very first pilgrimages in the ninth century. A bishop of Le Puy must have been the first one to gather people to accompany him to the tomb of the holy apostle. So Le Puy has a beautiful cathedral, is by far the most authentic starting point for the Camino, and also if you move along it, you will meet the most interesting monuments, getting this eleventh-century atmosphere of the pilgrimage. And then the last historical route is the one in very much south of France now. It has its starting point in Arles and it’s called the Vía Tolosana, for Italians, Swiss, Slovenes, Austrians. So, people coming from middle Europa. And Vía Tolosana passes through Carcassone, Béziers, Toulouse. Currently also through Lourdes, which is of course very much more a recent pilgrimage destination, but you can combine it if you follow the Camino de Tolosa, of Toulouse.
Gabriel: Well, let’s face it. Who could resist a two-for-one pilgrimage combo? With so many historical starting points in France – Tours, Le Puy, Vézelay, and Arles – I imagine there are also several ways of crossing the Pyrenees.
Frank: For the Pyrenees crossing, there’s, I would say, three main options. The first one is along the coast, so south of Bayonne. Then you arrive at San Sebastián. You cross the Pyrenees but you do not escalate them, of course, because you’re along the coast. The second one, which is the most authentic historic one, is the escalation from Saint-Jean- Pied-de-Port, in French side of Basque Country, up to Roncesvalles. Roncesvalles, Roncevaux in French, is this historic place where Charlemagne and Roland got defeated by the Basque in the eighth century. And so you can find, on top of the Pyrenees, the grave also of Roland, the nephew of Charlemagne. I mean, it’s a wonderful place. It’s 1050 meters, I think, about, above sea, so you have climbed something like 700 meters from Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, and whether you do it on foot or by bike, it’s a heavy climb, one of the most, I would say, daring parts of the Camino. But when it’s on top, you are in Spain, in Roncesvalles, and then you have another 800 kilometers, because Santiago de Compostela is all the way in the west of Spain. People sometimes think, “When I cross the border between France and Spain, well, I’m close to Santiago de Compostela.” It’s not the case. There’s a very, very long part waiting and it’s a difficult one.
Gabriel: Absolutely. It’s important to point out that Roncesvalles is dominated by this monastery that is nestled in the Pyrenees. The weather is often very foggy and rainy and it has a bit of a mystical quality to it, to see this monastery coming out of the fog. It does feel very medieval at times, depending on the weather.
Frank: It does, and actually, if you start in Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, so you have one day climbing up to Roncesvalles. If you go by bike, it’s a few hours heavy climbing and you’re prepared for the Camino by the time you reach the top.
Gabriel: Yeah. If you weren’t prepared before, you’re prepared now.
Frank: At least you know what effort it will be.
Gabriel: Yes. Okay, you’ve mentioned three ways. That was two. One along the coast. One, the classic one, between Saint-Jean and Roncesvalles. And what’s the third way across?
Frank: Well, the third one is the passage of Somport, summa portus, the “highest gate” in Latin. and Somport is more to the east, so it’s above Pau, and from Pau through Oloron you move up to this Somport. A passage, it’s much higher than the Ibañeta, the gate at Roncesvalles. Somport is 1700 meters, if i’m not mistaken, while Ibañeta is only 800, 900. But Somport, it’s a much more easy climb. It’s much longer, so from Oloron you have 28 kilometers of continuous climbing but, okay, it’s something like four percent. It’s a long effort but it’s doable, while the Ibañeta at some points is twelve, thirteen percent climbing, which is, with a loaded bicycle, very heavy. From Somport you are on what we call the Camino Aragonés, and you pass by Jaca and a few places which are really worth seeing, and which have much less pilgrims, pelegrinos, and most – I would say ninety percent of the pilgrims – pass by Roncesvalles, so if you make it through Somport you will have a longer, and much more lonely, but you will see many interesting places that you will would miss if you go by Roncesvalles. That’s the three options, I would say. I’ve done many Caminos. I’ve done seven, I’m preparing my eighth one, so I tried it all. I did the four historical routes in France, I did the three passages over the Pyrenees, and then in Spain of course you have many options to reach Santiago de Compostela: by the coast, by the mountains. You can go for the most popular ones, which are usually the most easy ones and which have a lot of accommodation and a lot of services, or you can try the more adventurous ones, but then of course you’re more on your own.
Gabriel: I think it’s worth mentioning a little bit about these other routes that do not converge on the Camino Francés, just because from everything i’ve heard, there are so many people on the Camino Francés. It’s really a pilgrimage highway, and I know that Kris said that’s not something that he’s interested in doing. It’s possible to have, I believe, a bit more of a relaxed experience. I myself have gone to Santiago twice. One was the Camino Francés in 1997, before it was that popular, so I have some very good memories of that trip. And then the other way I’ve done it is the Vía de la Plata from Sevilla. It sounds like you’ve done that one as well, because you’ve done all of them, and so I think it’s worth talking a little bit about that, because my experience was – at least in 2014, when I did that one – there were still refugios and different accommodations and the menú del peregrino. You know, the low-priced food options, and those things were still available, but there were so many fewer people. It was really such a relaxed way to go. There was no overcrowding. So I’d like to hear a little bit about your opinion about going from Sevilla or starting in Portugal and going along the coast. what are the advantages and disadvantages of going these less popular ways?
Frank: You’re very right. The Camino is becoming a bit a victim of its success. So my first Camino, along the Camino Francés from Pamplona over Logroño, Burgos, León, to Santiago de Compostela was in 2004, and I always travel in fall. So, second half of September, beginning of October. In 2004, I think, along the Camino I must have met not more than ten cyclists. So 800 kilometers, ten cyclists.
Gabriel: Wow.
Frank: It was very rare at the time, and actually I had a booklet, a Dutch booklet, it indicated three bicycle shops along the whole Camino. And the other thing was that in 2004 I think the total of number of pilgrims over the year must have been something like maybe fifty, sixty thousand maximum, while now, this year for example, half a million pilgrims are expected to reach Santiago de Compostela. So it’s ten times more, mostly along the same way. Well, whatever season and especially in summer of course, but there’s always people on on the road going to Santiago de Compostela. And the last 200 kilometers to Santiago de Compostela from Sarria, it’s a bit of a skiing highway yes.
Gabriel: You know, one thing that’s funny is that I recently heard from a different guest that they are now paid luggage transfer services.
Frank: The Spaniards, they coined the new words for this. We were bicigrinos, we were peregrinos on our bici. So we had peregrinos on foot and bicigrinos on the bike, which is the real pilgrims, I would say. But now they speak of turegrinos, and turegrinos is touristas peregrinos. And touristas peregrinos, they don’t even know what that Camino stands for, but they know it’s an interesting way and that there’s a lot of accommodation and a lot of people and a lot of fun and a lot of restaurants. What I see, certainly last time I did it in 2019, is the group of people on a mountain bike. That traveling group, and so they they start from an albergue, and then all the bags or with the van are brought to the next destination and then they, with Strava on, of course, they go as fast as they can to the next destination along the Camino. So it’s become kind of a sportive tour also, without any link to pilgrimage or history or things that we go for.
Gabriel: Incredible. Who would have guessed it?
Frank: Yeah, well certainly not Santiago de Compostela. It’s too much, and you feel it on arrival also. When you arrive in Santiago de Compostela, the special treatment you thought you received as a guest, as a peregrino, be it through cheap accommodation, be it through the menú del día – at the time, seven euros – it’s getting a bit lost. It’s certainly become much much more commercial than it was 20, 30 years ago. So for, I would say, the more authentic experience, it would be good to consider other routes. For Spain, this is certainly trying to avoid the Camino Francés. Now, I may say if you do not do the Camino Francés you will miss a lot of highlights of the Camino, because the Camino Francés, which is the authentic route from the Middle Ages til now has most hospitals, monuments, churches, cathedrals… more than any other route. So for sure, if you go for the historic part and you consider it a bit as a like a touristic discovery, then the Camino Francés has more to offer than any other route, but if you go more for the… How to say? How could I call it? The spiritual, the loneliness, the distance, the effort, then possibly other routes are more interesting now. And then you already mentioned what I consider the most authentic one, which is the Vía de la Plata, and the Camino de la Plata, from Sevilla over Mérida, Salamanca, to Santiago de Compostela. It’s wonderful, it’s empty, it’s lonely. It follows the historic Roman road from the first century to Astorga, to the tin mines, the silver mines in the north of Spain. It’s the road also which was used by the Moors to conquer the north of Spain. It’s the road which was used by the colonizers from Spain. The Conquistadores they recruited along these roads. The people went down that route to go to Sevilla and embark on boats to go for the Conquista in North and South America. You know you’re on a historic road and you see remnants of it. You would even see some milestones from Roman times. It’s impressive, but you’re not in this tourist crowd I would say. The same maybe for the Camino Portugués which is from Lisbon along the coast. It’s the second most popular one, after the Camino Francés. It’s much more empty, but still you will find the support and the accommodation for pilgrims. Maybe not that many albergues, refugios as you call it. Another one is the north coast, Camino Primitivo as they call it, because it was used in, I think, tenth century, when there was counterattack from the Muslims and the Camino Francés could not be used safely. So people took the coastline, the northern coastline, which it’s a heavy trip. It’s much more difficult than the Camino Francés, because there’s not one kilometer flat. It’s always up and down, up and down, and you have the very strong western wind. Think of it, if you cycle, that probably from the Pyrenees to Santiago de Compostela – so, 800 kilometers – you might have in some seasons 800 kilometers of headwind. You go west, west, west, and the wind is west, west, west all the time. Sometimes you say, “Oh, when will this ever end?” But okay, it’s a pilgrimage. As they say it in Spain, “You don’t gain if you don’t have pain.”
Gabriel: I guess that’s the Camino that I know the least about, because I’ve also cycled along the coast in Portugal, but I’ve not gone along the northern coast of Spain. So are there also facilities for pilgrims and the same sort of treatment there?
Frank: There are. If you are speaking in bicigrino, so a pilgrim on a bike, it’s not really a problem, and with a bike here you can easily add another 20 kilometers in the evening to reach an albergue or a small hotel. But you have to plan. You have to plan more than you would have to do along the Camino Francés. The Camino Francés has 270 albergues all along, so it’s almost every two, three kilometers, and a lot of private accommodation – small hotels, B&Bs, things like that – while the Camino Primitivo (the Camino del Norte) has much less pilgrims accommodation, of course.
Gabriel: When you begin the Camino, you receive a passport – officially called the Credencial del Peregrino – essentially a booklet with blank spaces that gives you the right to spend the night at the albergues along the way. The albergues in turn confirm your stay by stamping your passport. When you reach Santiago, you may present your completed passport to receive a certificate called the Compostela. To qualify, you must complete the last hundred kilometers, if traveling on foot or on horseback, or the last two hundred kilometers by bicycle
Frank: Because it’s a much less used Camino, you feel more of a real pilgrim. There’s some effort to be done. It’s not a prepared tourism, I would say.
Gabriel: It sounds like you might also face the most difficult weather conditions there. You’ve mentioned the constant headwind, but also northern Spain, that’s the worst weather in Spain, in terms of rain and gray and stormy. So, aside from the wind on that path you might also face terrible weather, whereas on the Vía de la Plata, it’s a bit different because it goes through Extremadura and depending on when you go – that’s an important thing to mention – weatherwise, you should really avoid the peak summer months, I think on the Camino Francés but definitely on the Vía de la plata, because Andalucía, Extremadura you’re going to have temperatures north of 40 degrees celsius. So, more than 100 degrees fahrenheit.
Frank: Correct, and actually weather is always an element to take into account. We think mostly of spain as a sunny tourist destination. Until May, sometimes the weather, especially at the foot of the Pyrenees, and quite inland Spain already, can be very harsh. You will have a lot of rain and cold in the Pyrenees, and then the other end of the summer season, which is September, October. Rain season starts in october and Galicia has more rain than any other region in Europe, except maybe Ireland, it’s a bit the same exposure to the Atlantic Ocean. It can be rain for weeks, and very, very heavy rain. And then people ask, “What is the ideal season?” I would think of June and September. With a bike, if you can, avoid mid-June to mid-September. With every road you take, it will be hot, hot, hot, even the Camino Francés. The meseta between Burgos and León, there’s not one single tree. You cannot hide for the sun. It’s really, really terrible. But even then, especially on the bike, think of the headwind which can be blowing for days and days and very strongly.
Gabriel: You said you’ve done seven Caminos, and you’re preparing the eighth one, and so I’d like to hear what do you have in store for this eighth one? Because it seems like you’ve covered all of them already.
Frank: Correct, yeah. Four ones, I had my starting point in Belgium, in Schaerbeek, where I live. I made the four historic routes through France. So, from Schaerbeek to Tours, the other one to Vézelay, then the third one to Le Puy, and finally the one to Arles. If from Brussels you want to take the Camino, the Vía Tolosana, you have to first go down from Brussels all the way to the Mediterranean, so it’s a very, very long Camino, something like three thousand kilometers. And then, I had also three Caminos with a historic starting point on the Iberian Peninsula. The first one was the Camino Portugués, then the Vía de la Plata, of course, which like for you, Gabriel, it’s our preferred one, and then I had the Camino de la Lana, which is from Valencia. Valencia, Toledo, Salamanca. Now I’m going for what is called the Camino Mozárabe, and its starting point is Málaga. From Málaga up to Salamanca and then to Santiago de Compostela. I would say every city in Spain, just like every city in France, nowadays, is lying on a Camino. They create caminos almost every month, so… because of course people have understood that if your place is along a Camino, you will have passersby and you will have tourists, you will be able to offer accommodation. You did the Camino Francés also in the ’90s. So my first time was 2004, which was a bit also at the beginning still. At that time, there were still conflicts between villages along the Camino Francés to have the Camino passing through their village, because of course they knew if they would be on the Camino that they would have all these passersby, and it’s a bit like a tunnel. You have all these pilgrims, I can even call them a bit tourists, on a corridor of something like 500-meter width, and two kilometers further you have nobody. So if your village and your hostel is lying two kilometers from the Camino, you will not see anybody. Tracing the Caminos is, and naming them and putting signs, has become a bit of a commercial effort. I see it even in Belgium here. Every historic city is on a Camino now. They take the word “camino” and then they take the Latin name for their city, or for a river, and they say, “Look, it’s an authentic Camino because it has a Latin name!”
Gabriel: Well, this is very interesting and I made the same observation. First of all, it’s important to say that the Camino is incredibly well marked. You have these yellow arrows and the scallop shells that are the symbol of Santiago on every rock, tree, house. You really can’t go wrong, and this was in the ’90s, so now I can’t imagine how they’re doing it, but maybe there’s neon signs or something. So you can’t miss it. On the Camino, even back then, you had all of these restaurants, accommodations, the two or three bike repair shops, the place that sold camping gear. There was some kind of provision for it and there was people. As soon as you left that – as you said, 500-meter wide corridor – suddenly you were just in regular Spain and there was none of this, and you could see the economic impact of the pilgrims, in terms of how the main streets were or the bridges.
Frank: Well, I think the economic impact of half a million pilgrims…
Gabriel: Yes.
Frank: It’s enormous. You see it in Santiago de Compostela. In 25 years, this city has turned into one of the most popular tourist destinations, also, apart from the pilgrims. So for this year they were expecting half a million pilgrims, but on top of that three million tourists. And so that three and a half million people, mostly in the summer period, and you feel it on everything: the prices, the hotel room reservation you have to make in advance. Certainly in the 90s and when I did it in 2004 and 2008, we didn’t make any reservation we just arrived, we went to a pilgrim’s house, we were accepted, we could store our bike wherever we wanted. All this has gone. If you don’t make a reservation in Santiago de Compostela, you will, like, be sleeping in the streets.
Gabriel: Yeah, people ask me if I ever want to go back, and to be honest, my answer is, “No, not on the Camino Francés.” I have such incredible memories of it for me. You could say it was a bit of a life-changing event, and I don’t want all those memories to be ruined by the reality of it today, because it was something special.
Frank: I understand you, and I have the same feeling, but I have another thing: I will be arriving for the eighth time, I hope, God helping, on the day on my anniversary. So my anniversary is the fourth of October, the Feast of Saint Francis, and I’ve managed already seven times to arrive in the holy city of Santiago de Compostela on the day and the hour of my birth.
Gabriel: Wow.
Frank: There’s an extra tradition for me.
Gabriel: When you say “anniversary,” I think you mean your birthday.
Frank: Yeah, my birthday yes.
Gabriel: Yeah, that is very cool. I want to then talk a little bit about another interesting aspect of your experience with the Camino, and that is that you were an hospitalero. How was it seeing it from the other point of view?
Frank: Maybe first start with the concept. Already from medieval times, there was a accommodation offered of course along the Camino, and also a lot of people had to be treated they had to be assisted medically in hospitals. So most of this was done by volunteers. Traveling in medieval times was very difficult: a lot of sicknesses, food was not regular, even water was sometimes poisoned or salted. In medieval times, ten to fifteen percent of the pilgrims didn’t make it, and died along the Camino or died on arrival. You went down, you had to come back also on foot. So it’s from the Low Countries here, it was a minimum of six months’ travel, and when you left, nobody knew whether you would ever come back or not. From that tradition, the people taking care as volunteer for pilgrims along the Caminos are called hospitaleros, so people working in a hospital. Well, we are not really working in hospital, but we are still called hospitaleros. A lot of churches convents offer accommodation and some of them even for free, even still nowadays, and of course there has to be some like warden, I would say, or q manager of the place. It’s volunteers also, it’s hospitaleros. Now, because of the success of the Camino and the number of places that were arranged for pilgrims, there’s always in Spain a shortage of volunteers to take care of the pilgrims. And that way in 1997, I believe, a Flemish pilgrim fell upon a initiative in Los Arcos. Los Arcos is a small town, 1500 inhabitants, and was thinking of converting an old school into a pilgrims house, and they had done so and the first year they had been working with local volunteers, but the problem was the city is small and they didn’t find enough volunteers to take care of the welcoming and the helping of pilgrims and this Flemish lady, called Mikke, offered her help for the next season. So she did. A year later she was there with a few friends and they run this albergue for the whole summer, but they found out that running an albergue for six months it’s a very difficult and tiring job. And they came up with the idea to form an association here in Belgium, in Flanders, called the Friends of the Camino, of course, where they would try to find volunteers to help them running this albergue in Los Arcos, and so they did and from ’99 on, every year they sent couples of volunteers to run the albergue for two weeks. These couples would be responsible for the welcoming of the pilgrims, for the household of the albergue, for cleaning the accommodation etc. I had stayed twice in that albergue, the Flemish albergue as we call it, although it’s Spanish, it’s fully Spanish. I found it a very interesting volunteer job, so in three consecutive years, ’11, ’12, and ’13, I also worked as an hospitalero for two weeks in the albergue municipal, the city albergue of Los Arcos, and it was a very very interesting experience. So it’s an albergue in an old school, again, 82 beds which offers accommodation for pilgrims on foot and pilgrims with their bike without reservations, so people have to come to the albergue and show up from twelve o’clock for people on foot and from six o’clock in the afternoon for people with their bike, and if there’s room they can stay for a minimum price, over one or two euros, in the albergue. But of course, if you’re in responsible for the albergue, it’s quite a job, because you have to register all these pilgrims, you have to assign beds, you have to explain how the kitchen works, where they can find services, where they can go for shopping, where they can go for medical help if needed. You have to help them with the small pilgrims problems, which usually pop up after a few days. Los Arcos albergue is situated at Day Six of the pilgrimage. A typical pilgrimage from Roncesvalles in the Pyrenees to Santiago de Compostela is thirty days. Thirty days of walking of an average of 27 kilometers a day, and Los Arcos is at 130 kilometers from the Pyrenees. So it’s Day Six, and Day Six is considered to be the most difficult one, the day you have, as a pilgrim, you have a dip, the day you don’t believe that you can do it anymore, because your back hurts, your feet hurt, you have had rain for six days. And then they ask me at the reception desk how far is it, and I say, “Well, it’s still 621 kilometers.”
Gabriel: No Frank. It’s only 600 kilometers.
Frank: This is really where these pilgrims, they need a lot of, I would even say, psychological help, and that’s what we also offered, giving them courage, testimonials of people who had it difficult at Day Six, but who persisted and finally made it. That’s the real side of the pilgrimage, which I would say as a hospitalero, you really get very close with them, because people approaching you, people explaining the problem most often are people who really wanted to go for it and then, after six days, see how difficult it is.
Gabriel: Yeah, by then, the blisters have swollen up and if somebody has a bad knee, it’s starting to really hurt by then or if you weren’t wearing the right footwear it’s starting to really hurt, so it’s a very interesting point, as you mentioned, in the Camino, where you are stationed.
Frank: Yes.
Gabriel: What’s one story from your time there that really stands out? I’m sure you have many.
Frank: Well, one story is, I think a German pilgrim, in his 70s, already maybe 80 years, who was with his bike, and a bit unprepared, I would say. This person living in Germany, somewhere close to Mainz, if I remember well, a few years before his pilgrimage, he had had very serious heart surgery. As people often do is, you want to be saved of course. Sometimes people at the time they turn to religion, and so he said that he had prayed for his recovery and that he had promised Santiago de Compostela to go on the pilgrim tour if he survived the operation. So he did, and then of course he was confronted with his promise. His children and grandchildren they said, “No. Look, Grandpa. You will not do that. I mean, you are not in a condition to cycle all the way to Santiago de Compostela. No way! We prevent you from doing this. You cannot do that.” So this man for months prepares his Camino secretly, at a friend’s house. So he had bought a bike, he had bought bags, he had prepared doing some small cycling tours in Germany, but all this secretly and always making sure that only his friend, who stored the bike also, was aware of what he was doing. When he finally wanted to leave for Santiago, he had told his children and grandchildren that he would do a small tourist tour in Germany with his friend with the car. But what he did was, going to his friend’s house he took his bike and he cycled away from Mainz all the way to Santiago de Compostela, without a mobile, just maps. When he was in Los Arcos he told me this story. His children must have gone worried, but they were stopped by that friend of his saying, “Look your father, your grandfather, is on his way to Santiago de Compostela. He’s doing well, but he does not want to be disturbed, and he will get in touch with you when he arrives in Santiago de Compostela.” And I found this – I mean this was really – it was very emotional to hear this story and to see how he had persisted and he had made through his promise.
Gabriel: So in the end you hope and believe that this man made it to Santiago but you don’t know for sure.
Frank: I’m sure. I mean, Santiago already helped him through his surgery so why wouldn’t Santiago help him all the way to Santiago de Compostela?
Gabriel: Definitely. Then we’ll call it good he made it.
Frank: Yeah, yeah. And in medieval times, no I don’t wish it for the German, but in medieval times, when you died along the Camino, you were sure of your place in heaven.
Gabriel: Oh gosh, okay, yeah.
Frank: No true. No, no, no, you were… you died along the Camino, you were saved.
Gabriel: Yeah I’m sure. I just didn’t want to think about this poor German man dying on the Camino.
Frank: All the pioneers of the Camino, especially the Padre who invented the flecha amarilla, the yellow arrow, they have died, most of them, and along the Camino you will find monuments to them.
Gabriel: Oh, really.
Frank: Yeah, yeah. Small monuments. The Padre, he has a statue, not very far from Astorga.
Gabriel: Oh, that is hilarious.
Frank: For me, the older pilgrims, they have more interesting stories. It’s not just for the sports and for the Instagram pictures, but they travel with specific purpose and I want to hear that. It always gives me ideas and new ideas on how to look at life and what the real important things in life. You, you learn it along the Camino if you pay attention to it, if you go into small churches, if you take some time to reflect and to go away from the the big crowds. Be open to small things and that’s another advice I would give.
Gabriel: Yeah I think that’s excellent advice. You could say, mindfulness. Be mindful about where you are. Some people are mindlessly doing the Camino, because they’ve heard that it’s cool and so forth, but there are so many little details along the way that are really worth stopping and looking at, whether that’d be going into some church… There’s the famous place that I remember where they have two faucets one of them dispenses water and one of them dispenses wine.
Frank: Yeah, I know.
Gabriel: That’s Irache, I think.
Frank: Close to Estella.
Gabriel: Yes, exactly. And for me, it was such an amazing discovery because, how many times have I filled my water bottle at a fountain somewhere? And then, okay this looks like a regular fountain but wait, what? Here’s a fountain where you can get wine? It was just such a beautiful little moment. Now, everything is cataloged, detailed, pointed out, and it’s more difficult to make these incredible little discoveries, but I think it’s still possible, if you open your eyes and have a sense of wonder. That’s why with these turegrinos or these people who want to go as fast as they can, I think they’re missing the point.
Frank: Correct, and then another question which is often asked to me is whether I would do it with friends or by myself. And actually I’ve done so seven Caminos, four in company with friends and three by myself, and now I would definitely go by myself, because the Camino is worth exploring by yourself, in loneliness, in isolation. And you will not be lonely and you will not be isolated, because you will meet people, you will be open to other people, and you will discover things, and you will grow into the Camino. Because, if you go with a group, if you go with people you know for a long time, you might be talking and chatting all the way, and all of a sudden see oh you’re in Santiago de Compostela, and you would not even have realized it, while if you’re by yourself, in your head, you’re pushing, you’re sweating, you’re becoming tired. All the time, you’re thinking of Santiago de Compostela. I have to make it, I have that many days left, that many kilometers left. It’s a journey, and it’s such an emotional outburst when you arrive, that you would never have if you would not pay attention to it, if you were traveling group, for example, and having the traditional way of having fun every day with friends, and eating and drinking in the evening. This should not, in my eyes, this should not be the Camino de Santiago. Do this for something else. Cycling to Berlin or to Prague or I don’t know what. Grab the opportunity that the Camino de Santiago can be something different, and make something different of it, because there’s so many other occasions to go with the crowd I would say. It’s a wonderful, wonderful experience. We started by saying that, especially for the veterans like we, we’ve known another time. Twenty, twenty-five years ago it was much more of an adventurous Camino. You felt like a real guest in Spain and not like a tourist. All this has has gone a bit, that’s true. It’s unavoidable. It’s the success of the Camino, but still it’s very, very worth doing it. Please do it while you can. It’s a must.
Gabriel: Yeah, absolutely. We’ve covered a lot of ground and I think all that’s left for me is to wish you “buen Camino” in October and hope that once again you make it on the day of your birthday. Very, very good planning. Maybe you can let me know when you make it
Frank: I will, and it’s a promise I will keep. I would finish with “ultreia et suseia.” In Occitan language, it means “always further and always higher,” and that’s what kept the pilgrims going.
Gabriel: Well, after listening to Frank, I am tempted to load up my bicycle and head straight for Santiago. I won’t be doing that, of course, but at least I have a good excuse. In August, my wife Sandra and I, along with our ten-month-old son Emilio, will be doing some bike touring. Sandra and I have a dream of bicycling the entire perimeter of Germany one day, and this year we are going to bike from Schaffhausen, which is actually in Switzerland, to Saarbrücken. The podcasting equipment is staying at home, so there will be no episodes in August. Stay tuned for another exciting episode coming September sixth. Ultreia et suseia.
Gabriel: The transcript for this episode is available on the Accidental Bicycle Tourist website. I welcome feedback and suggestions for this and other episodes. You’ll find a link to all contact information in the show notes. If you would like to rate or review the show, you can do that on your favorite podcast platform. You can also follow the podcast on Instagram. Thank you to Anna Lindenmeier for the cover artwork and to Timothy Shortell for the original music. This podcast would not be possible without continuous support from my wife Sandra. And thank you so much for listening. I hope the episode will inspire you to get out and see where the road leads you.
Frank: Every time I go, I go mid-September, beginning of October, so it’s always the same season and I have two problems. I eat that many figs that my hands stick, and I eat that many walnuts that my hands become yellow.
Gabriel: Well, those are good problems to have.