The Pilgrimage Traveler is on a Spiritual Journey to a New Way of Being
For centuries, the path has called. Now, "The Pilgrimage Traveler" invites you to answer that call.
Are you seeking journeys that stir your soul, challenge your body, and awaken your spirit?
With the Pilgrimage Traveler, you'll discover ancient trails that offer more than just a physical walk. These are opportunities to explore sacred landscapes, connect with fellow seekers on the pilgrim's path, and find the quiet strength within as you walk towards deeper meaning.
The very essence of being a Pilgrimage Traveler lies in the hope of self-discovery, of uncovering something profound you didn't know before. Your transformative journey starts here.
If you are passionate about traveling and you have always wanted to travel to aid your personal growth, you have come to the right place.
🙋♀️ Why Trust Us at the Pilgrimage Traveler?
We’re not a travel agency ~ we’re pilgrims, just like you.
We've walked Pilgrimage Routes Across Europe!
💬 We’ve:
- Gotten lost so you don’t have to. 😉
- Followed yellow arrows in the glowing sunlight, the pouring rain and by moonlight. ☀️🌧️🌙
- Slept in albergues, hostals & casa rurals. Ate and drank in cafés along the way. 🛌 😴
- Created detailed and downloadable GPS maps and eBook Guides, full of must-have information based on real pilgrimage travels. 🧭 🗺️
- Shared our complete journeys, step by step to help YOU plan your ultimate pilgrimage and walk with your own Heart and Soul. 💙✨
Every detail is from our own experiences ~ no fluff, no AI rewrite. Just fellow pilgrims sharing the way. We add a touch of spirituality, a big dose of ❤️ and lots of wisdom from the road.
Ultreia and Safe Pilgrimage Travels, Caminante! 💫 💚 🤍
On this website, I'll share my own experiences as a Pilgrimage Traveler and hopefully help you in opening your own eyes to becoming one yourself. More than just an ordinary traveler, you'll embark on a spiritual journey that complements the physical journey, instilled with a sacred purpose.
As a traveling pilgrim, you approach unfamiliar surroundings with a willingness to embrace a different perspective. This journey goes beyond typical sightseeing, inviting you to experience a living culture instilled with a spiritual presence that resonates from the past, exists in the present, and perhaps even hints at what lies ahead.
The Pilgrimage Traveler maintains an open awareness, recognizing the potential for discovery – a new trail or vista in all its sacred beauty, just around the corner!
Every journey holds the possibility for inner transformation. By engaging your senses fully at a sacred site – observing, feeling, listening – your travel can deepen into a truly spiritual experience.
Indeed, the essence of being a Pilgrimage Traveler isn't limited to traveling to distant lands. Any journey that takes you outside your routine, whether nearby or far away, can become a pilgrimage. In fact you can experience a pilgrimage-in-place even when you remain at home!
A pilgrim encounters each sacred place with presence, appreciating its unique power and the accumulation of human and divine stories woven into its fabric over time.
What is a Pilgrim?
We can call a pilgrim one who travels to a holy place for a specific purpose. The purpose might simply be for adventure through travel to a foreign land. Not all adventurers are on an inner journey.
I believe that without a spiritual goal, traveling is often reduced to a quick glimpse of a place or sacred site, often only through the lens of the camera, before rushing onward to the next location. This is NOT my desire, nor do I believe it should be yours.
The pilgrimage traveler takes a journey to exotic and not-so-exotic spiritual sites that have great significance for the culture in which it lies. Every single culture has sacred sites, or special places to where people take sacred journeys.
The best pilgrimage is one that requires difficulty to reach, either by walking or by rough and inaccessible roads. Effort brings meaning to the journey.
Long-distance walking clears the mind. It grounds the seeker and strengthens self-awareness. This is why I pilgrimage to mountaintops. It keeps me in the moment, requires effort that is more than physical and puts life and its problems in perspective when you reach that glorious summit.
The journey to the mountaintop is a spiritual metaphor for life. But then, isn't all travel a metaphor for your life's experience? Especially when you remove yourself from your ordinary existence to encourage something new to manifest?
What better way to stretch your personal experiences and take you out of your comfort zone than through pilgrimage travel?
"Still round the corner there may wait
A new road or a secret gate
And though I oft have passed them by
A day will come at last when I
Shall take the hidden paths that run
West of the Moon, East of the Sun."
~ J.R.R. Tolkien
The Pilgrim's Purpose
The purpose of a pilgrim's travel to a particular sacred site may be singular, or perhaps it is many fold, depending on the intent of the individual and/or the group.
The seeker is seeking to discover something out of the ordinary, something that is missing in his or her life. Traveling to foreign places and foreign lands jolts one out of the everyday, the routine and the mundane.
In order for the pilgrimage traveler to be successful, he/she must move beyond their usual perceptions. They must be willing to open wide their senses to see, feel, touch and experience, not just the place, but the journey in a new way.
It is perceptually seeing with new eyes, hearing with new ears, feeling in a new way, and spending the amount of time needed to open to these new experiences of the holy place.
Most pilgrimage travelers are seeking to find one, if not all of the following personal attributes as a result of their long journey ~ peace, healing, unity, worship, forgiveness, inspiration, clarity, spiritual instruction, life direction, adventure, connection and most importantly, presence of something bigger, beyond themselves.
For the pilgrim, the purpose is the search for personal transformation.
One of the most insightful experiences of my life came when I discovered that you can have a spiritual journey and personal transformation, without ever going anywhere! This pilgrimage-in-place is just as effective as an actual journey.
"Seeing" With New Eyes as a Pilgrimage Traveler
But can you truly learn to see more than just the physical site itself? Are you willing to use all of your senses, to feel the energy of the place? Are you an ordinary tourist, passing through, snapping a quick photo of the place and then rushing to the next "sacred site?"
If a journey is truly a inner journey, what happens if you set your camera aside for awhile? What happens when you arrive at the spiritual site at sunrise or sunset? What if you meditated at a site, or did Yoga? What if you read extensively about the history of the sacred place and the human experiences there, both past and present?
There are many more questions that can be asked. Ask yourself to experience everything actively ~ feel, breathe and absorb in this most holy place with a new lens. And that lens does not always come attached to a camera. And if it is attached to a camera, the shots are unique and open to a new way of seeing the subject matter.
I traveled to the Santuario de Chimayo, a tiny Catholic mission church deep in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains near Taos, New Mexico. Pilgrims to this site believe the dirt contains special healing powers.
As I toured the grounds, and the chapel, seeing all the offerings of talismans, rosaries, and crosses, how could I not feel the energy and emotions of the thousands of supplicants over the years who cried to God for healing?
Pilgrims come to the Santuario, seeking healing by eating the holy dirt, drinking it in water, or smearing it on themselves. I did not care what my belief was, I just basked in this energy of faith. And yes, I took some dirt for myself, just in case I needed it in the future!
Are You Being Called to Walk With a Purpose?
Do you long to go on a soulful trek? Do you feel your energy rise when you think about a inner journey? Are you searching for your soul's purpose, a change in direction or just a release from the "real" world? Are you longing for simplicity?
Spiritual travel is about going out to go in as John Muir, the great naturalist, likes to say. The pilgrimage traveler is open to inner discovery through outer awareness.
Experiencing the jolt of the unfamiliarity in the outer environment when you travel, causes you to examine yourself internally, doesn't it? Walking long distances also brings your mind to an internal place of contemplation, doesn't it?
If you say yes to any of these questions, a pilgrimage is in your future.
When you journey as a pilgrimage traveler, you open yourself to a new way of experiencing life, others the sacred site or whatever comes your way.
Instead of insulating yourself with familiar food, hotel chains, resorts and experiences, you open yourself to feel all the sensations of being in the new situation. If you are willing to open all your senses to become vulnerable, this will be a life-altering experience.
The Pilgrim is opening him/herself indeed, to a new way of being.
Won't you join us in a spiritual journey and experience all this Sacred Earth has to offer by opening yourself to personal transformation? What journey is your soul longing for?” Will you be a pilgrimage traveler?
If you are ready for your own pilgrimage traveler journey, start your journey here ➤ Camino de Santiago.
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🙋♀️ Why Trust Us at the Pilgrimage Traveler?
We’re not a travel agency ~ we’re pilgrims, just like you.
We've walked Pilgrimage Routes Across Europe!
💬 We’ve:
- Gotten lost so you don’t have to. 😉
- Followed yellow arrows in the glowing sunlight, the pouring rain and by moonlight. ☀️🌧️🌙
- Slept in albergues, hostals & casa rurals. Ate and drank in cafés along the way. 🛌 😴
- Created detailed and downloadable GPS maps and eBook Guides, full of must-have information based on real pilgrimage travels. 🧭 🗺️
- Shared our complete journeys, step by step to help YOU plan your ultimate pilgrimage and walk with your own Heart and Soul. 💙✨
Every detail is from our own experiences ~ no fluff, no AI rewrite. Just fellow pilgrims sharing the way. We add a touch of spirituality, a big dose of ❤️ and lots of wisdom from the road.
Ultreia and Safe Pilgrimage Travels, Caminante! 💫 💚 🤍
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Need suggestions on what to pack for your next pilgrimage? Click Here or on the photo below!
Carbon fiber construction (not aluminum) in a trekking pole makes them ultra lightweight. We like the Z-Pole style from Black Diamond so we can hide our poles in our pack from potential thieves before getting to our albergue! There are many to choose from! (See more of our gear recommendations! )
Gregory BackPack - My Favorite Brand
Do not forget your quick-dry microfiber towel!
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