Slow Travel on the Via de la Plata

"Take a walk outside – it will serve you far more than pacing around in your mind."

Rasheed Ogunlaru

Embracing the Slow Travel

Hiking with Intention on Camino

Today, we set out onto the Via de la Plata, after nine days on the Via Augusta, where we eased into the rhythm of walking with several shorter stages. During this hike, it became abundantly clear that we are no longer the same people who set out on the Camino Francés almost a decade ago. Nor are we those intrepid explorers who crossed Portugal on the Camino Portugués, followed ancient paths in the UK, walked the GR 65 Via Podiensis in France, or, not so long ago, completed the 28,000 km long Trans Canada Trail, from the Atlantic to the Pacific and to the Arctic Ocean.

Nearing fifty, we cannot deny that our bodies have changed. We can no longer cover twenty kilometres in three hours under full pack weight, and we carry with us more aches, more fatigue, and more reminders that time reshapes every adventure.  Our bodies grow tired more quickly, and aches and pains linger in ways they once didn’t.

As the saying goes, you can never walk in the same river twice. Each Camino, like each stage of life, requires a different awareness and a different approach. On the Camino Francés, it was about learning to trust the process of pilgrimage. On the Portugués, it was about community and connection. On the Trans Canada Trail, it was about sheer endurance, resilience, and learning how to live for years within the rhythm of the trail. Now, on the Via de la Plata, we find ourselves needing to walk more slowly, to listen differently, and to embrace the journey not as a test of strength but as an invitation to be present.

Slow Travel and Camino

While long-distance hiking has always been considered a form of slow travel, we now find ourselves embracing its principles in their fullest sense. It is not about speed, or about mindlessly ticking destinations off a list. Instead, it is about pausing, savouring the moments, and allowing the experiences to sink in and change us.

If the Via Augusta was about long days in marshlands alive with birds and the serenity of being immersed in nature, then we hope that the Via de la Plata will be more of an inward journey. Where we can walk, find answers to questions, and embrace the time and space that we have available to us in the hope that clarity will emerge.

For us, slow travel means remembering that the point of the Camino is the act of walking itself.  It is not about racing to the next stage, and not merely arriving at the cathedral in Santiago. Pilgrimage is in the doing, in the steady rhythm of one step after another. It is a way of decoupling from the routines of everyday life, disconnecting from the constant static of social media, and reconnecting both with the natural world and with those we meet along the way.

Beyond this, we know that life-changing choices await us when this pilgrimage ends, including decisions that will shape the decades to come. Just as the Caminos in Spain, Portugal, and France, as well as hikes in the UK, each revealed something different, and just as the Trans Canada Trail taught us endurance and humility, so too we hope the Via de la Plata will teach us something new.

And so, we walk with intention, carrying both our questions and our hopes, trusting that the Way itself will help guide us toward what comes next.

Walking as a Balm for Modern Society

We are also heading out hiking as a means of escaping the noise of the digital world. As have so many in recent years. Indeed, across Europe and beyond, Caminos and other long-distance hiking trails have seen a surge in popularity. What was once the domain of a few determined pilgrims and hikers has become, for many, a sought-after escape. Walking has become a kind of release valve - a way to shed pent-up stress, anxiety, and disillusionment.

The growing popularity of trails like the Via de la Plata is a reflection of modern unease with the uncertainty and criticism produced in the digital world. Beneath the surface lies a recognition that our culture feels sick, unsustainable, stretched thin by speed, consumerism, and constant distraction. Stress and fear have become the silent catalysts pressing many of us to the edge, and more and more people sense the need to pause before something cracks. Walking, in its simplicity, becomes a balm. Indeed, in a world increasingly shaped by screens, algorithms, and noise, the act of walking offers something profoundly countercultural.

Walking provides direction, certainty in the simple rhythm of one step after another, and community in the quiet bonds formed on the road. Pilgrimage in particular holds out the promise of connection beyond the self - beyond the illusory forums of online life - to something both ancient and enduring.

To put on a pack and set out along a Camino is not to solve all of the problems of modern life, but it does allow us to step into a different rhythm where healing is possible. On the trail, time expands. Anxiety loosens its grip. A kind of sanity returns in the steady repetition of footsteps, in the wide skies overhead, in the conversations with strangers who share your path. If society at large feels frayed, pilgrimage offers a way to weave back together - quietly, slowly, step by step.

Starting the Via de la Plata

This year’s pilgrimage is an ambitious one. In combination with the Via Augusta, the Camino Sanabrés, and the Camino Fisterra, we will cover more than 1,200 kilometres - a true coast-to-coast walk that carries us from Cádiz in the south all the way to Santiago de Compostela and finally to Muxía on the wild Atlantic coast of Galicia. Along the way, the Via de la Plata will mark the 14th, 15th, and 16th Camino routes we have hiked and completed.

We arrived in Seville two days ago, after finishing the Via Augusta, and gave ourselves time to rest and recharge before setting out again. Those days were a gift: wandering through the soaring Catedral de Sevilla, strolling shaded paths in public parks, circling the grand Plaza de España, and simply letting ourselves enjoy local food and the pulse of the city. It was a gentle pause between trails, a moment to breathe before taking on what we knew would be a very different kind of Camino.

We set out in late April, planning to walk through May and June earlier than we usually begin a pilgrimage. The timing was deliberate. This route is infamous for its punishing summer heat, when daytime temperatures soar well into the mid-forties Celsius. Spring and autumn are considered the only realistic seasons to attempt the Via de la Plata, and even in April, the sun is said to be fierce.

As we shoulder our packs today and begin to follow the yellow arrows northward out of Seville, we carry with us a mixture of anticipation and uncertainty.

We knew this would likely be the hardest Camino we had ever walked. What we did not yet realize was that, while it would not be the route we had hoped for, it would prove to be the path we most needed in this moment - a way not only across Spain, but deeper into the questions and choices that awaited us beyond Santiago and back home.

See you on the trail!