Letter Four · Preparing for the Camino

Camino Chronicles: How to Train for the Camino de Santiago

Train your body, your mind, and your heart for the road.

Hey you, it's me.

By the time most people start asking how to train for the Camino, they are already thinking about miles, shoes, hills, and whether their legs are ready. I was too. Somewhere in the middle of preparing, I realized I was training for more than the road. I was training my body to keep going, my mind to get quiet, and my heart to be ready for whatever showed up out there.

This letter is part of the Camino Chronicles, where I'm sharing everything I learn, live, and walk, from preparing for the Camino to the trail itself and eventually coming home.

Here is the honest truth first. Some people train for months. Some people do not train much at all, and they still make it to Santiago. This is your Camino. There is no single right way to get ready.

For me, preparing was not optional. I live in a body that aches every day, so I needed time to learn what helped me keep moving, what drained me, and what recovery actually looked like. I started about six months out. If you are already an active walker, you may need less time. If you are starting farther back, or your body needs more grace, give yourself more runway.

You are not training to prove you can suffer through the Camino. You are training so you have enough of yourself left to experience it.

Train Your Body

Start with the body you have. If you are older, have been inactive, or live with a chronic condition, talk with your doctor before you begin a demanding plan. Start slow. Build carefully. There is no prize for cutting it close.

• Build your distance slowly. Start with shorter walks and add a little at a time. Longer walks teach your feet, your joints, and your energy what a Camino day actually feels like.
• Practice back-to-back days. This is the part people forget. Walking a long way once is not the same as walking, sleeping, waking up sore, and doing it again. The Camino is consecutive days. Train for that.
• Train your recovery and your sleep. Rest is part of the plan, not a break from it. Notice how your body feels the next morning and what helps it bounce back. And learn how you sleep, because the Camino means early mornings, strange beds, and a body trying to recover overnight. Practice a steady bedtime, and if you will be in shared rooms, test your earplugs and eye mask before Spain. If poor sleep wrecks you, let that guide where you choose to stay.
• Train your feet at home, not on the trail. Pick the shoes and socks you plan to use and walk in them until they feel like part of you. Break in more than one pair if you can, so your backup is not brand new. Spain is not the place to find out your shoes rub after mile eight.
• Strengthen your whole body. I added weightlifting, rowing, and the stair stepper. Your legs matter, but so do your hips, your core, your back, and your balance. Whole body strength keeps you steady when the road gets long.
• Train on real ground. Climbs get all the attention, but going downhill is hard on your knees, and uneven trails ask more of your ankles than a smooth sidewalk ever will. If your route has hills and rough ground, practice them, in both directions, before you go.
• Find your pace. The Camino is not a race. Practice walking slowly enough that you can breathe, talk, notice where you are, and still have something left for tomorrow. Learning a pace you can sustain will save your body later.
• Add your loaded pack later. Once your legs and feet have a base, start walking with the pack you will actually carry. It teaches your shoulders, back, and hips the weight, and it gives you time to find out whether the pack really fits before you leave.
• Practice eating and drinking on the move. Do not wait until Spain to learn what your stomach and energy need on a long day. Notice what breakfast works, how often you need a snack, how much water keeps you steady, and even how your body's bathroom rhythm responds to all of it. You are learning your own rhythm, not someone else's formula.
• Let your route shape your training. Look back at the route you chose. Hills, heat, rain, pavement, and daily miles all matter. Your Camino is yours, so your training should be too.

Train the body you have, not the body you wish you had. That is enough.

Train Your Mind

Here is what nobody told me. The hardest part of the Camino may not be your feet. Some days, it may be your mind.

I thought the Camino was calling me because I have been grieving. Journaling showed me that was only part of it.

So I started training my mind the way I trained my body, a little every day. I shut down my phone. I walked alone, without headphones. I stopped filling every empty minute with noise. I was learning how to be with my own thoughts before I was ever miles from home.

• Practice the quiet. Do not let day one on the trail be the first time you sit with yourself in silence. Start with a few minutes. Let your nervous system learn that quiet is safe.
• Train for the ordinary miles. Not every mile will be profound. Some will just be miles, with no view and no revelation. Learning not to need constant stimulation is part of the preparation.
• Practice changing the plan without calling it failure. A shorter day, a taxi, a rest day, a slower pace. These can be wise choices. The plan is a tool. It is not a test you have to pass.
• Prepare for a bad hour without turning it into a bad Camino. Rain, soreness, homesickness, fear. A hard moment is information. It is not a prophecy about the rest of the journey.
• Use facts before fear. One question I practice is this. Is this a fact, or is this an emotion? My feet hurt is a fact. I cannot do this is an emotion. Facts help you make the next decision. Emotions deserve to be felt, but they do not always get to write the ending.
• Write some of it down. I journal in the morning about what I need for the day, and at night about whatever is still sitting in my head. Sometimes the page can carry what my body does not need to.

You are training your mind to stay present, so the Camino feels less like a shock and more like a continuation.

Train Your Heart

I wanted to prepare my heart, not just my backpack. When I went looking for something that held the history, the Scripture, and the meaning together, I could not find quite what I needed. So I built it.

My preparation is rooted in my Christian faith, because that is where I return when I need grounding. You do not have to share my faith to walk the Camino, or to feel something shift in you. Come as you are. Take what speaks to you and leave what does not.

• Let go of needing a revelation. You may cry. You may feel nothing. You may come home with clarity, or with more questions. Let the Camino be what it is, instead of demanding it fix something.
• Let yourself be helped. Some of us are far better at helping than being helped. The Camino may ask you to accept directions, a slower pace, a hand with your bag, or kindness from a stranger. Receiving is part of the pilgrimage too.
• Let others have their own Camino. If you walk with someone, you may not need the same pace or the same quiet. Sometimes loving someone on the trail means giving each other room to walk differently.
• Notice what you are ready to put down. You do not need the answer before you leave. Just start noticing what feels heavy. What fear, what story, what grief keeps showing up? You may understand it differently once you are walking.

I am carrying a stone from Rome to lay down at Cruz de Ferro, a burden I am finally ready to set on the mountain. That story deserves its own letter.

And here is the most freeing thing I learned in all of this training. I get to choose.

I get to choose my pace. I get to choose my day. I get to choose when I rest. I get to choose when I ask for help. I get to choose my next step.

There is something holy in remembering that the next step is yours.

Train your body to keep moving. Train your mind to stay present. Train your heart to remain open.

So tell me, which part of you needs the most training right now, your body, your mind, or your heart? I would love to know where you are starting.

More letters are landing soon. Until then, explore the Hub for everything that is live.