Pilgrimages

Could travelling with purpose be a postpandemic trend?

Like many pilgrims who walk the Camino de Santiago network of pilgrim’s routes, Sherly Cho had no obvious religious motivation. Back in 2018, she took a five-week hiatus from her Korean-Swiss cookery school in Zurich, ready for a challenge. But Sherly never anticipated that the 500-mile pilgrimage from St Jean Pied de Port, in the French Pyrenees, to Santiago de Compostela, in Galicia, northwest Spain, would inspire major changes in her life.

The year before Covid-19 slammed the brakes on international travel, the Camino de Santiago witnessed record pilgrim numbers. According to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela’s Pilgrims Reception Office, 347,578 hikers received their Compostela certificate in 2019, a year-on-year increase of 6%. Its records also showed that a growing number were solo pilgrims, like Sherly, and that only 40% of all pilgrims claimed religion was their sole motivation.

“Galicia’s towns are special, but you wouldn’t give them a second look unless you arrived on foot,” says Sherly. She was even more impressed by her natural surroundings, despite enduring a baptism of fire along the way, involving blisters, bed bugs and four days of solid rain. “I’ll never forget the divinesmelling eucalyptus forests and the remote, desert-like mesetas [plateaus], where there’s nothing but open horizons, sand and the sound of your own thoughts and footsteps,” she notes.

More travellers than ever are embarking on pilgrimages, which offer a unique way to explore and experience a destination. Between 2016 and 2019, sales for all Camino de Santiago routes soared. The increase was especially dramatic for the Caminho Português (pilgrimage routes starting in Portugal), which skyrocketed by almost 100%. Lesser-known routes are becoming increasingly popular, such as Camino Invierno; this offthe-beaten-track alternative for solitude seekers arriving in late autumn and winter takes in many of Spain’s romanesque chapels and vineyards.

Tim Williamson, from UK travel company Responsible Travel, believes pilgrimage holidays will boom in a post-Covid world, as people move away from shorthaul city breaks towards fewer flights and longer trips with a sense of purpose.

“In recent years, our pilgrimage bookings have risen markedly,” says Tim. “They’re very popular with solo travellers, but increasingly families are embarking on them too. Lockdown has shown us that community is important; people want space but miss human connection. Pilgrimages tick many of these boxes.”

Beyond offering walking pilgrimages, such as the 141-mile Pilgrims’ Way, from Winchester to Canterbury, Responsible

Travel deviates from the norm, widening the focus with the likes of kayaking and self-guided cycling trips along the Camino de Santiago.

“Many people still consider a pilgrimage to be an epic, solitary journey — and, of course, it can be,” says Tim. “But ultimately pilgrimages are personal.

For some, they’re spiritual or religious; others are drawn to the history and culture. They can also help you switch off and reconnect with nature. Even a few days can be rewarding and refreshing.”

Bookings for traditional routes also look set to soar in 2021. “We’re expecting a surge in bookings for this year’s Xacobeo, or Holy Year, when the Feast of St James (25 July) falls on a Sunday, which last occurred in 2010,” says Mary Lawless, at self-guided walking holiday specialist Macs Adventure. “Consequently, pilgrims who walk the Camino will be able to enter the cathedral by the ‘Holy Door’. And those who visit the apostle’s tomb will obtain plenary indulgence: the complete forgiveness of all sins.”

Natural remedy

Choosing a journey immersed in nature — an increasingly common reason cited for taking up a pilgrimage — would have resonated with early Celtic saints of the fifth and sixth centuries, such as St David. In the Middle Ages, the eponymous Welsh city was a pilgrimage destination rivalling Spain’s Santiago.

The Shrine of St David, in its resplendent medieval cathedral, is the climax of a new week-long pilgrimage trail for 2021, forging the Celtic connection between Ireland and Wales as it treads in saintly footsteps along the wavehammered shores of County Wexford and Pembrokeshire.

“On these coasts, you still feel the spiritual connection with the living landscape,” says Iain Tweedale, a guide with both Journeying and Guided Pilgrimage who’ll be leading this new tour. “It’s what the Celts called a ‘thin place’, where the gap between heaven and earth is small,” he says. “After several days walking, when the mind calms, you observe your surroundings more keenly, seeing simple things like rocks, flowers and birds as if for the first time. The outer journey from place to place becomes an inner journey from head to heart.”

If, as Iain suggests, the slow pace of coastal pilgrimage lets us re-encounter a rhythm we’ve lost — where the tides and seasons, not the clock, become our reference points — can pilgrimage help us heal and provide perspective in a post-pandemic world?