This ride was the idea of my cycling partner John Fitzgerald, my brother-in-law.

I was in Ireland in March of this year (2014) when John mentioned he was thinking of undertaking a bike ride from Seville, in Southern Spain, to Santiago de Compostela in the north, following the route of the old Roman Via de la Plata. I was feeling up, I had a hip replacement in August last year (2013) and the recovery had been great, so feeling optimistic I blurted out ‘maybe I will go with you’ without of course understanding what that entailed!!

Firstly, this is one of the routes of the Camino di Santiago, a christian pilgrimage since the 700’s.

VDLP route

The most popular camino route is known as the Camino Frances , which starts in St. Jean Pied du Port in France, crosses the Pyrenees and crosses northern Spain to Santiago de Compostela. Our choosen  route is known  as the Camino Vía de la Plata Ourense option or the Camino Mozarebe, is one of the two routes that branch from the Vía de la Plata at or near Zamora and that lead directly to Santiago thereby completely bypassing the Camino francés. This is the longest route at 960km and some would say the most arduous with a cumulative climb of approximately 10,000 m.

The folllowing description I took from the site http://www.csj.org.uk (CSJ – Confraternity of Saint James)

Overview: The Camino Mozárabe or Vía de la Plata

The route used by the Mozarabic (Christian) pilgrims during the period of Muslim domination and by all those coming from the south of Spain, including those who arrived in Seville by sea from North Africa and other parts of the Mediterranean.  Also known as the Vía de la Plata as it follows the course of a Roman road of that name (but note that the name does not mean ‘Silver Route”:  plata is a corruption of an Arabic word indicating a ‘broad surfaced road’).

The Route. 1000km camino starting in Seville and leading north via Mérida, Cáceres, Salamanca and Zamora.  After that pilgrims can continue to Astorga and from there to Santiago via the Camino francés or go there directly through Galicia via Pueblo de Sanabria and A Gudiña and from there take either the northern option via Laza, Vilar de Barrio and Xunqueira de Ambía or the (slightly longer) southern one via Verín, Xinzo de Limia and Allariz, after which the two routes meet up in Ourense. It takes, on average, 7 to 8 weeks to walk from Seville to Santiago.