Pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela

[Ritahugues]

Hello everyone,

We are leaving the 6th of May to do the camino portugues. We would like to start at Lisbon, however we have a few questions before we start this adventure...
First, is there accomodation for this stretch of the camino? If so, where and how much does it cost? Is it easy to find?
Second, is the road well marked? Can we easily find our way?

Thank you so much!!! Any help is welcome and very appreciated.

Rita and Hugues

[sillydoll]

For a lovely brochure on the Lisbon to Santiago route go to: http://www.amigosdelcamino.com/ Click on caminos on the left hand side, and then on Camino Portugués
There are 68 pages but I only printed out the map pages for a friend.

[Ritahugues]

Thank you very much for the reply.

I looked on the site, but how do you know about the places to sleep? Are there really any? Are they open? If not, where do you go? ...

[peregrina2000]

I think that Javier knows a lot about this route, so maybe he will jump in here. My concern would be the marking. I was just in Lisbon last week, and spent a fair amount of time in the area around the cathedral. I never saw (but wasn't looking for) any markings of the route. And my eyes are fairly sensitive to arrows! The online guide that Sil refers to has detailed walking instructions ("keep to the left on the Calcada da Cruz, turn right onto Madre de Deus," etc), so it may be that they are a substitute for arrows.

I was in a church south of Lisbon on this trip, in a town called Santiago de Cacem, and appropriately the church is also the church of Santiago. There are some wonderful old carvings, and a stone relief of Santiago Matamoros. I asked the man at the entrance about the Caminho in this part of the country and he told me it was essentially ignored. He said there have been noises made about reconstituting the trail from the Algarve (southern coast) but no action.

My impression was that the Camino Portugues is marked north of Porto only, but this information could be out of date. When I was considering walking it in 2004, we ultimately decided to start in Valenca do Minho, right on the border with Spain, because our information was that there was not much marking or infrastructure in Portugal. I do know that there have been several albergues opened in Portugal since that time, but I believe they are north of Porto as well. But I think you will need to be prepared to stay in private accommodations for most of the walk.

I don't mean to be discouraging, and as I've said, it's very possible that my information is way out of date. I think it would be a wonderful walk, from Lisbon north, and I hope that if you undertake it, you'll let us know how it goes! Good luck, Laurie

[sillydoll]

A friend of mine is going to walk from Lagos to Santiago via Lisboa and Fatima - starting on the 1st August. He has bought John Merrill's book North to Santiago De Compostela Via Fatima (http://www.johnmerrillwalkguides.com) He is not expecting any albergues until he reaches Porto.
If you would like a diary of a pilgrim's walk from Lisbon a few years ago, let me know and I'll email it to you.

[JohnnieWalker]

Sil has maybe pointed to a source which goes some way to answer the accommodation question:

http://www.amigosdelcamino.com/php/uplo ... Lreduc.pdf

Although the brochure is in Spanish and Portugese the maps clearly indicate where there is accommodation - marked with an A inside a circle - the A standing for alojamiento or accomodation rather than albergue.

[Ritahugues]

Thank you sooooooooo much for all this help!

I would love to have Sil the diary with the notes of the walk.

Thank you.

Rita & Hugues

[Javier Martin]

Peregrina2000, I have to give thanks to, among all, my friend Alex from Lisbon for his very great work in the Camino Portuguese. Last 2007 he was the responsible of the painting arrows between Lisbon and Porto and now it's a real Camino, very well painted. From Porto it's the same. I know it just from Barcelos, arrows are perfect!!

Que tengais un muy buen Camino

Javier Martin
Madrid, Spain

[peregrina2000]

Hi, Javier,
This is terrific news about the marking all the way from Lisbon. I would think that the route would become popular quickly, and maybe someday it will be marked all the way from the Algarve. Thanks for this good news, Laurie