Gio's Signage Selection

Sorry for recent blog silence, but we've all got jigsaw addiction and when you start puzzling, evenings disappear before you know it!

But back to the Camino, It never ceases to amaze me that I can set off on a walk of several hundred miles without a proper map, and not get lost.

That this is possible, is all due to the amazing sign posting along the way. The traditional yellow arrow painted onto features (hopefully permanent ones!) indicating the way ahead, is the simplest and oldest way mark. It is all that is needed and works perfectly. You can't imagine the good feeling and reassurance that seeing your next yellow arrow brings.


On our recent trip there was just one place where more yellow arrows are needed and this was in the heart of the large town of Ponferrada. Normally, unless there is no other direction to go but ahead, you can see your next arrow. In Ponferrada there were stretches where this was not the case, and we had to keep going hoping and trusting another yellow arrow would appear; thankfully it always did!

While a yellow arrow is all that is needed, as the camino has got busier, the signage has got more sophisticated. Invariably the modern signs still include the yellow arrow, but they also include the traditional camino emblem of the cockleshell, appearing rather attractively and significantly as a sunburst.

The forms these twin emblems of the camino take are many and varied. Here are some of my favourites starting with the wall mounted tile, beautifully simple:


There were lots of these pseudo trig points along the way:


They were very good for seeing some way off and they also provided a fine perching point for a rest. The drawback was that they tended to attract a lot of graffiti - clearly many find the simple white background irresistible.

Occasionally we'd come across a 'one-off', seemingly the creation of the local municipality, and these were great as no two were ever the same.


I particularly liked the wooden ones as they always gave the impression of being hand made by a local craftsman.

However, these wooden ones, resembling the footpath signs at home, didn't seem to have quite the same touch of a craftsman. Mind you, by now we were getting very close to Santiago and, the closer we got, the less individual the signs seemed to be.


These last signs, however, were rather special as they appeared on the streets of Santiago leading up to the cathedral.


It was a good job that there were so many of them as the cathedral failed to reveal itself until almost the last moment. It certainly wasn't a case of being led in by the spires; mind you with so many pilgrims to follow, we could hardly get lost.

Lots of love Gio and friends xxx

The Big One

For any pilgrim, 'the big one' will always be the cathedral at Santiago. It is a fine church in it's own right, but, as the end point of the Camino, it has a significance far beyond it's outward appearance as a grand place of worship.

I always had the impression that the cathedral was the heart of Santiago and would dominate the city. We were therefore all very surprised that it took so long to catch our first glimpse of the famous towers. We seemed to have been walking through Santiago streets for ages before, all of a sudden, and completely unannounced, they suddenly appeared ...


I got very excited and even more so when, a few minutes later, it was there in front of me, in all it's splendour. What a facade! Despite the square being quite busy, I could have sat there in silence and admired it for ages.


However, the other chaps were keen to see inside so in we went. We weren't surprised by the rather ornate, and to us overdecorated, surrounds to the centrepiece of St James, but we were surprised that it was much smaller than it's outward facade implied.


There are 2 aspects to the cathedral that stay with you. Firstly, the botafumeiro; we talked about it at the time we were there, but none of us will every forget it's size, it's crazy swing and the ethereal singing from the amazing singing nun that accompanied it - simply awe inspiring.

The second lasting impression is that it is very much a shrine to St James. As a non Catholic, I kept wondering where Jesus was. St James was after all a disciple, not Jesus. I hunted around to see if I could find Jesus in the cathedral and I managed it, he was on the wall by one of the side doors. I still feel he should have far more prominence.

The cathedral takes on a whole dimension though, once you've picked up your Compostella. I was so pleased and proud when mine was awarded to me. There is no better place to have a picture taken with your compostela, than in front of the cathedral


I don't think I'd have felt the same way about the cathedral if I hadn't walked there. I can't imagine just flying into Santiago and going to visit. I guess I'm the lucky one, whose had the marvellous opportunity of walking there.

Lots of love Gio and my fellow camino bears xxx

Gio's Church Selection

I'm sure you won't be too surprised to hear that we did visit one or two churches along the way. The numbers weren't as great as you might think, due to the fact that, as we found on our earlier trip, the Spanish do tend to keep their churches locked. It's a great shame.

Quite soon into this trip, we walked through the big city of Leon. The Camino took us right past the entrance to this magnificent cathedral ...


The office where we went to get a stamp for our pilgrim passports was just after the rather fine screen in our next picture...


The artwork was so intricate that there was almost too much to see. I concentrated on the colours instead as I'm a simple soul, and found some of the frills too much.

In contrast, I really loved the simplicity of the church at Rabanal. It was just outside the albergue we stayed at, run by the English Co-fraternity of St James. It was very old and very peaceful. When we arrived a French pilgrim was playing his recorder inside and it sounded wonderful.


A few days later we went into a church that was open and, while the church was not really to my taste, with a bit too much gold and heavy decoration, I was more pleased that you can imagine, to see my old friend St. Roch, with his dog, again. We saw St Roch quite a lot in France but only occasionally in Spain. He is the patron saint of pilgrims and was a similar sort of figure to St Francis of Assisi, so, with me being a Franciscan bear, there is an immediate affinity.


You'll always know if you've seen St Roche as he always has his very distinctive thigh wound and the dog who saved his life by bringing him food when he was sick, at his feet.

We'll talk a bit more about the big one, Santiago Cathedral, next time.

Lots of love Gio xxx