In the Footsteps of Saint James - The 2021 European Tour & Jubilee Camino Pilgrimage

We hope you can join us on our Jubilee European and Camino Pilgrimage 2021 Tour.   It is shaping up to be a very special trip and one we all will truly deserve.

2021 is going to be a very special year on the Camino de Santiago, as it is considered a Holy Year or Ano Xacobeo. This means that the feast of Saint James, 25 July, falls on a Sunday. This only happens every few years and the last Ano Xacobeo was 2010, 10 years ago. In fact, due to leap years, this holy year happens only 14 times in a century.

Pilgrimage is an experience common to all religions and cultures. In it, what is proper to human nature finds expression. The world does not constrain the human person, but rather like a waymark, opens it to transcendence, to God. Humankind has always known that the world is not its final destination, that here we are always travellers ...

“Leave your country, your people, and the home of your parents, and go to a place which I will show you”. (Genesis 12: 1)

Christians enact the pilgrimage of faith. The Church defines itself in this world as a pilgrim Church, in search of the heavenly homeland. The profound meaning of pilgrimage for Christians can thus be understood. We do not go in search of the divine to some far off unknown source, but rather return to the depths of our own faith, find the experience of the truth in our own lives, renew our own existence, while reaffirming the need and the possibility of forgiveness, of compassionate embrace, of the grace of jubilee.

“It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end”. (Ernest Hemingway)

Besides the Camino, we will also be visiting Rome and its surrounds and the  popular Spanish cities of Barcelona and Madrid.

The Vatican and Rome are holy cities to the Roman Catholic Christian faith. Rome is the seat of the Papacy since the 1st century AD and later home to the Vatican, where the Pope resided since the 14th century. Traditionally, the See of Rome was founded by Saint Peter who first held the position of the Pope or Bishop of Rome. According to UNESCO St. Peter's basilica in the Vatican is the largest religious building in the world. Today Rome has a Cathedral and more than 900 Churches and some of the most prominent Catholic churches can be found there as well as many important Catholic institutes.

We will also be heading to  fabulous Assisi, this is a hill town in central Italy’s Umbria region. It was the birthplace of St. Francis (1181–1226), one of Italy’s patron saints. The Basilica of St. Francis is a massive, 2-level church, consecrated in 1253. Its 13th-century frescoes portraying the life of St. Francis have been attributed to Giotto and Cimabue, among others.

Barcelona is adorned by the famous art and buildings of Gaudi, the most specatular being the La Sagrada Familia Bascilica.

We will walk the final 110kms journey from Saria to Santiago de Compostela and arrive on Sunday 26 September, to join with fellow pilgrims and celebrate Eucharist in the Cathedral of Saint James. On Tuesday we will travel (on bus!) to Finisterre to make the journey complete, as James did.

As we walk together, we will stop, reflect and spend time in some of the most beautiful places of the journey. With our accommodation taken care of and our baggage transferred each day, we will have a wonderful opportunity to explore the well-worn path at a leisurely pace. See why thousands of people before us from all over the world have found this pilgrim path so rewarding.

“Were not our hearts burning within us while he walked and talked with us on the road?” (Luke 24: 32)

I look forward to walking the jubilee journey with you.

Go gently

Paul Skippen