About Me

Now that expectations have been brought into line, let’s talk about my trip.

 

We have all herd (just fooling with you) something along the lines of ‘the longest journey starts with a single step”.  My first step was on May 9, 2022 in a text from a friend telling me of the walk to Santiago.  I had been doing a lot of walking during COVID, but with no aim but to get out of the house and get some much needed exercise.  At first he idea of making a 500 mile walk was just too far out of reach, but in time the pilgrimage gave me a newfound purpose for my walking.

 

I will leave on April 15th to fly to Los Angeles, then the next day I fly to Paris.  The flight represents the only reservation that has been made for this trip.  After getting to Paris, I will figure out how to get to St. Jean Pied de Port in France to access the trail and start my 800 kilometer walk west across northern Spain.  I will only walk the one day in France, the next 30 plus days will take place in Spain.  Lodging will be on a first come, first serve basis as I walk into towns and villages along the Way. The most basic of accommodations are albergues which are like a hostel for pilgrims in Spain.  These can be semiprivate rooms to dormitories with 100 plus additional pilgrims.I expect my days to be a meditation of simplicity.  Get up early, walk, eat breakfast, walk, eat lunch, walk, walk, walk, find lodging, wash clothes, take a shower, find dinner and sleep.  Start over the next day.

 

Why I chose MillionFootSteps.com.

 

I average 2,150 steps per mile, 480 miles later I will have walked over a million steps.  Most of us do that amount of walking or more every year, we just don’t think about it or plan to do it in 5 weeks.  Millionfootsteps was not my first choice, but millionsteps and millionfootprints were already taken.  I have come to really appreciate the idea of footsteps and now like it more than the first two ideas.  All three are related to the movement of our feet, but footsteps have the additional meaning of following someone else’s path.  In this case, people have been making this pilgrimage since the 800’s AD when the bones of St James were discovered by a hermit.  Since then, millions of people have made this walk, some with success and some without.  The pilgrimage has regained popularity in the last 30 years, now the majority of people do not walk for religious reasons, but some estimate that 300,000 people will walk on the Way starting at various locations along the trail.  Some walk it all at once as I hope to, but others will break the Way into parts and walk a week a year until finishing up the walk.  I start in St Jean Pied de Port, but the trail paths stretch out across all of Europe.

 

About me

 

Nothing about me says athlete.  I am 57 years old.  Played few team sports in my youth and didn’t like any of them.  One year during high school, I was unable to participate in the standard PE class, so the school allowed me to go for a walk of at least one mile every day.  This was my first experience of walking for exercise, and I remembered liking it.  I should have stuck with it at the time, but of course I did not.  15 years went by before I started to walk again for exercise, it was hit and miss, but I have done it ever since.  I have read many articles that talk about how people can make this walk solo, I have never done anything like this before and it will take me out of my comfort zone.  I definitely do not speak French and my Spanish is limited to words I hear second hand while living in California.  My plan is to walk as best and as far as I can, interact with others I meet as well as I can and come home with a wonderful story.