Do You Want to Camino with Me?

I am not a lone pilgrim out here; I am one part of a grand pilgrimage extending beyond the horizon and back into time.

—Kevin Codd, To the Field of Stars

Pausing for a café noisette at Refuge Orisson along the Rte Napoléon in the French Pyrenees.

In June of 2023 Jamin and I hiked a portion of the Camino de Santiago to celebrate our 20th anniversary. It seemed like an odd way to celebrate. It wasn’t Hawaii or Bali or the Maldives. It wasn’t relaxing on the beach, sipping Mai Tai’s, or getting fancy for evenings of fine dining. It was miles and miles of dusty, muddy, cumbersome road that we walked on foot. It was sweat and rain and dirty clothes worn over again, knotted up calves and aching feet.

We only hiked one-fifth of the entire camino—100 miles from Saint Jean Pied de Port in France to Logroño in Spain. Most of the other travelers on The Way were doing the whole 500, all the way across Spain to Santiago de Compostela near the Atlantic Ocean. But those 100 miles were significant and stunning.

After getting our bearings on the trail, we began to settle into a rhythm. Wake up at 7am. Pack up. Eat breakfast, usually jamón and pan con tomate. Hit the trail.

We would hike anywhere from thirteen to seventeen miles a day towards a particular town where we had a bed and a shower waiting for us. Once we arrived, we’d rest (usually for me it was a dramatic collapse on the bed), roll out our aching muscles, shower, and meander around the town waiting eagerly for siesta to end so we could enjoy some pintxos and Spanish wine while sharing our highs and lows from the day.

This daily rhythm of intense physical labor followed by rest, relaxation, and reflection became our life for the seven days we spent on the trail. We were locked into this schedule, committed to completing the day’s walking itinerary even when we felt like stopping a few miles early or frankly just not starting at all. Knowing there was a new town and good food waiting for us on the other end made all the difference in those times when all I could do was put one foot in front of the other. It taught me to endure through the difficult times because rest was on the other side. And the celebration meal at day’s end taught me to savor the rest because hard labor was on the other side of that.

Stop and go. Rest and work. Inhale and exhale. Celebrate and lament. These were the natural rhythms that led to flourishing on this pilgrimage.

They are also the natural rhythms that lead to flourishing in our everyday lives. We are all perpetually on pilgrimage, after all. The Camino taught me to accept both ends of the spectrum and everything that lay in between as the natural and expected rhythm of life and also as a gift, for one does not exist in its truest form without the other. And God is present to us in all of it.