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| The route passes the Roman Aqueduct in Segovia |
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The on-line guides are written by pilgrims and are kept up to date with the information which pilgrims send to the editor when they have walked a route. Pilgrims providing guides for other pilgrims. The guides are updated regularly and up dates are available here http://www.csj.org.uk/guides.htm
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| Max walking the route |
A summary of the route:
The way from Madrid to Sahagún designated by the Amigos de los Caminos de Santiago de Madrid was never a major historic pilgrimage route but there are documented accounts of pilgrims who passed that way. Regained from the Moors early in the Reconquest, Madrid grew in size and prosperity to become a medium-sized town by the time Felipe II chose it as his capital in the sixteenth-century. Its population and economy grew further and today Madrid is a major, modern, European capital city. With the renewal of interest in the Jacobean pilgrimage in the twentieth-century, especially its huge popularity in recent years, the Madrid Amigos decided to create this route to enable pilgrims from Madrid and central Spain to journey to the Camino Francés without taking transport. The route is about 320kms long and can be walked in about 12 days. However, Segovia, Simancas (for Valladolid) and Medina de Rioseco merit more than a brief visit.
The way is excellently waymarked
throughout, so detailed walking directions are generally not necessary. Where
they are needed Walking Notes have been provided in this Edition. Physically,
the route is easy to walk. With the exception of the climb over the Sierra de
Guadarrama, there are no hills or gradients of any significance. Graphs of the
elevations throughout the route have been included in this edition, although
these are to be read with caution as
they merely indicate the height difference between towns rather than being an
accurate relief graph of the route.
Remarkably for such a direct route - almost
a straight line from Madrid to Sahagún - there is virtually no road walking.
The route uses footpaths, Vias Pecuarias (VPs), cañadas, farm and forestry
tracks and even a short stretch of paved Roman road, and the paths are clear
and well maintained. As a consequence, the journey is stress-free and one which
lends itself to reflection and contemplation, a true pilgrimage route. But the
corollary is that there are fewer towns, villages or pilgrims than on other
routes with the exception of parts of the Via de la Plata, which the Madrid
route closely resembles.
Buen Camino!
Guide: Camino de Madrid (Madrid to Sahagún)
