El Camino trail in Spain

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  sparkles on 11/04/2017 - 07:25

  +1

  Can recommend the hostel Travellers House in Lisbon if you are on a super tight budget accommodation wise.

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  derek324 on 11/04/2017 - 07:33

  +2

  Watch movie "The Way": http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1441912/ (I guess you have probably seen it).

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  porkandbeans on 11/04/2017 - 12:38

  +2

  I don't have any suggestions for flights, but I do for the Camino:

  • Sarria is a good place to start (115 km and 5 days comfortable walk to Santiago). You can get there by train which is handy.
  • Take a sleeping bag or at least something better than the hair net sheets you get at the albergues. Earplugs too. Definitely earplugs.
  • It'll probably be stinking hot and full of drunk Spaniards. Apparently a 100km pilgrimage is mandatory for them if they want to stay in the church after turning 18, so they have a bit of fun doing it.
  • You really don't need that much stuff, do take a decent knife though so you can cut up bread/cheese/meat/peregrinos.
  • If you stay in the municipal hostels (i.e. the 6€/night ones) in Galicia, don't be surprised if there is no cook or eatware in the kitchens. But it's summer so you'll probably have a huge choice of pilgrim menus in each town.
  • Don Simon is the finest vino tinto a euro can buy. Don't bother with anything else.
  • Buy extra food on a Saturday because stores aren't open on Sundays.
  • Don't stop at Santiago. Take three more days and walk to Fisterra, it's meant to be spectacular. I couldn't do it because I had already booked a flight out of Santiago. Seriously, people will look at you funny if you say you're finishing in Santiago.
  • And as the bunk above my mate's said, when you get to Santiago, make sure you say it's for religious reasons. I actually don't think the compostella is any different for religious or personal pursuits anymore so it probably doesn't matter.
  • Oh yeah, make sure you get two stamps a day too so you can get your compostella.

  Happy to answer any other questions too. Vueling do cheap flights in Spain and most likely Portugal too.

  • 

    scarface on 11/04/2017 - 13:33

    Awesome, thanks, @porkandbeans, @sparkles and @derek324 !

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  zappy32 on 12/04/2017 - 01:17

  +1

  Are you looking to go anywhere else in Europe and what are the dates you have off? Are you looking to stopover anywhere in Asia on either leg? What sort of budget are you on?

  Neither spot of the Depeche Mode tour will tie in well with the Camino so you'd be better off looking at which cities are better to get in and out of that time of year. If you'd want to visit other major cities in Spain such as Barcelona or Madrid then do that in between as flights will be cheaper to go Santiago-Madrid-Bilbao than Santiago to Bilbao for instance.

  The first thing you should be looking at is a decent flight from Bilbao to Lisbon.