March 2022
We are finally embarked on the trip we had planned for the same time (almost to the day) in 2020. We are planning to take a somewhat leisurely stroll (albeit carrying all our gear) from Seville to Santiago de Compostela — a distance of roughly 1000 kilometers — along the Via de la Plata. This route was used for hundreds of years to transport armies and materials (including metals) and cattle (and pilgrims). However, despite the name, it was never used to transport silver.
The most commonly cited explanation for the origin of the name is that it is a corrupted version of the Arabic term ”Al-Balat” which supposedly means ”cobbled road”, although I could find no such translation. Other explanations are that the name was derived from ”Lapidata” meaning “stone road” or “Platea” meaning “wide road”.
Although Spain is not without its share of mountains, the route along a series of interconnected Roman roads (the Romans often adapted pre-existing indigenous roads) is fairly flat — without any major ascents or descents such as the hike over the Pyrenees at the start of the far more popular Camino Frances. (This is not to say that we won’t notice a few hills).
We are planning to take time to enjoy the sights as we walk through the autonomous communities of Andalucia, Extremadura, Castile y Leon and Galicia. We shall visit Roman ruins (notably in Italica, Merida and Caparra), a couple of Visigothic structures, and the Unesco World Heritage cities of Merida, Caceres and Salamanca.
The route splits approximately 40 km north of the town of Zamora. We shall take the left fork which heads west to Santiago and does not connect with the Camino Frances (as does the right fork).
En route to Seville, we shall stop in Zurich for a couple of nights to see David.
I promise that future posts will be much briefer!