Congratulations Jim and Helen!

We have some terrific news here at Choose Your Own Camino. Our first clients, Jim and Helen, successfully completed their maiden pilgrimage last week!

Starting from Sarria, they walked about 115km through a mix of bustling Spanish towns and rural Galicia and arrived into Santiago de Compostela around 12.30pm on Thursday.

Camino

Highlights included:

• Pizza dinner with pilgrim pals

• Ringing the Liberty Bell then sprinting up the stairs to the historic town gate of Portomarín

• Witnessing the bagpipes and dancing on display at Palas De Rei's annual festival, before attending a pilgrims' mass

• Ethereal piano music permeating through a seculded forest

• Home made soup with local vegetables in a peaceful garden adjacent to the Camino

• Visiting the famous Bar Lino, as featured in the recently released Italian film Buen Camino

And many more in between. Not to mention the excitement of already planning their next Camino.

Jim summed it up beatufully, on night six, hours after witnessing the piano in the forest.

"You know how good my ears are, they're absolutely shot. I did assume it was those two blokes in front of us. As we approached towards the stream and glanced to my let, you see this chap over there playing this beauitful music.

"That made my day and any further hardships didn't mean anything after that.

“It was then I realised as part of this journey…it's not something you wanted to do 40 years ago, it's something you needed to do.”

Stay tuned for more stories from Jim and Helen's Camino in the coming weeks, and stand by for some very exciting news ahead of the Holy Year in 2027.