Walk the Camino de Santiago

Moon Camino de Santiago

By Beebe Bahrami

Over 1,200 years old, 500 miles long, and rich with tradition and sacred history: Embark on the trip of a lifetime with Beebe Bahrami and Moon Camino de Santiago.

Ever since she first stepped on to the Camino de Santiago in 1995, Beebe knew she found her place in the world and has delved deeply into these ancient paths and places across France and Spain. Having walked the Camino de Santiago now too many times to count, she has also lived on different stretches of the trail. She has survived pigeon, boar, and rabbit hunting season in the Pyrenees, gone mushroom hunting in Navarra, detoured with sheepherders in Rioja, practiced chanted prayer in Castile, pressed grapes in León, and studied herbs and rituals with a druid in Galicia.

Beebe's new, full-color guide includes strategies for walking the Camino, excursions to gateway cities, unique ideas for enriching your experience, essential planning information, historical background, and everything else you need to get out on the trail.

As a lifelong explorer of other cultures and Colorado native passionate for long distance treks, the Camino, which I first walked in 1995, offers multiple and compelling layers of great adventure through amazing ancient, wild, and cultural landscapes. Best known for its medieval sacred sites that form the backbone of the pilgrimage trail through southwestern France and northern Spain, the Camino passes through prehistoric territories deemed important, and at times sacred, by earlier peoples as well who were drawn to this dynamic corridor. This is what makes the Camino distinct from many other long distance hikes: Most days on the Camino’s trail will take you through preserved rich landscapes from prehistory to the present. The Camino offers a way to time travel simply by walking.

One epic day while researching and writing Moon Camino de Santiago took me 1.2 million years into the past to Europe’s oldest known human site at the Sierra de Atapuerca, a low mountain range just to the east of Burgos and right on the path of the Camino. I had already passed through stunning medieval villages, native pine forests, and sweeping high plains when I arrived in Atapuerca and signed up for a guided visit to the archaeological site. Donning a protective hardhat, I stepped into a deep trench—chock full of the remains of humans and ancient hunts—that had been cut into a Swiss cheese-like limestone hill of the sierra. Entering that trench, after a day of passing through other rich, if younger, layers of the trail, having enjoyed the camaraderie of locals and fellow pilgrims while eating foods harvested from surrounding farms and gardens, it viscerally struck me that this spectacular, wild, and fertile terrain across northern Iberia has been calling to humans for many more millennia than its present medieval and modern form and that their presence remains.