Santiago vs Cammino dei Briganti
We receive dozens of letters and messages like this one, which would like Santiago even where Santiago is not. We publish one with our reply, as an example, so that it may be clear to everyone that we are in two very different situations.
Hello, we would like to do the route (I, my wife and my 16 year old niece have done both the French and Portuguese Camino de Santiago and the one from Finisterre all of c.to 130 km in 6 days in the last 3 years, appreciating the splendid organisation of all the stages; for your information from them the luggage transport is 5 € per stage (we have read about the controversy over the cost) and the 'pilgrim's dinner' costs 9/10 € (and for those who want to sleep in a dormitory with shared bathroom, bunk beds bunk beds even 8 in a single dormitory like the military service of the past costs from 8 to 10 € including breakfast Spartan but sufficient) composed of appetizer, first course, second course, water and wine of course like lunch in the trattorias of the noon to us: this is also in our view one of the reasons for such success.
So as not to run any risks, we prefer to book our sleeping arrangements in advance (we have always done so at pensions or hotels with exclusive bathrooms in Galicia, since we are not young!) and we need the luggage transport service. For food we are not fussy, what you can find you can find!
We would like to know how to ensure these two things and whether the camino is organised to the level of the various 'Caminos de Santiago' that we have briefly outlined above.
For the transport service for those who are tired or sick from them along the way you can sometimes find the number of the local taxi and pay the legal fare (my sister-in-law used it one year when she joined us on the route) without many complications!
If you are interested in our experience: tel. xxxxxx and of course this email.
Thank you! Gianni
Answer from Luca Gianotti
Good morning, let's start with the cost of luggage transport. Obviously it costs €5 in Santiago, but in proportion to us it should cost €1. Carrying one bag or 10 bags is different. In Santiago, everything is a hundredfold, so the economy of scale lowers the cost. On our path, on the other hand, there is no public funding (in Santiago millions of euro), so the Cammino dei Briganti may be able to reopen this year with a provisional marker paid for by us volunteers, but it was not so obvious. The first thing to do when you come here is to avoid comparisons with Santiago, because there is nothing like it. You come here in a different spirit and with the clear intention of helping those who live here in an exchange of mutual generosity.
Nothing here resembles Santiago, everything is much more disorganised. There is not even a pilgrim hostel, there are neither the numbers nor the public funding to open one. Here there are only small private establishments that struggle to stay upright even though they are apparently less convenient because they are three times the price of Santiago. But not because they are all a bunch of profiteers, simply because for the usual economy of scale, they have to keep these prices if they want to stay open. And they are small establishments, with few beds; to have lower prices they should do as they did in Santiago, that is, cram in a number of beds per square metre that leaves a few cm between one bed and the next, but they would be distorting their style of b&b or agrotourism, those born one way cannot become hostels. Hostels should be born ex novo, and with public resources investing, as happened in Santiago. The discourse would be long, excuse me but I cannot dwell on it.
We know Santiago very well, if we received the same money that the Spanish government and the European Community gave to that camino, or even a tenth part, rest assured that we would be able to do the same.
If you come to the Cammino dei Briganti the spirit should be one of generosity, if they ask you for 10 € you should always give 12. If not, you will not be able to understand the meaning of reciprocity in a true walk like ours, a poor walk, born from below to help the below.
Which in return has something to give that you don't find in Santiago? That true spirit of true welcome, a whole people who communicate with the walkers as they pass by, people of an ancient and true culture who want to tell their stories. If in Santiago the wealth is above all the encounter with other pilgrims from all over the world, here the wealth is the encounter with the local people. If you are interested, come. If not, go to Santiago, there are a dozen routes there, you can walk a different one every year.
Or, in Italy, go on the Via Francigena, the only one that is receiving money from the Italian state and the region of Tuscany, a forward-looking region compared to all the others. Here you will find the air of Santiago, pilgrim hostels opened with public money, and more and more walkers from all over the world.
But if you are looking for something different and special, well, you can be sure that the Cammino dei Briganti is it. Those who have walked it know it.
26/02/2018