Travel destinations to go to with your dog: The Camino de Santiago
If you are looking at travel destinations for your holiday, where your dog can accompany you, or if you have already fixed your eyes on the Camino de Santiago, but you wonder: “Is it possible to do the Camino de Santiago with my dog?”, you have reached the right place. The answer is definitely yes; the Camino de Santiago is one of the best trips you can do with your dog.
Doing the Camino de Santiago with your dog is possible and one of the most advisable travel destinations for you and your pet. The famous pilgrim route is a place open to all types of pilgrims including animals.
Do you want to do the Camino de Santiago from Sarria with your dog? Tell us more about your plans and dates and leave the whole organization in our hands. We are happy to help you organize your pilgrimage!
In this article of our blog on the Camino de Santiago, we want to dedicate to all those people who organize their trips to destinations that you can visit with your dog or those who want to have the experience of travelling with your dog, for the first time.
Reasons to do the Camino de Santiago with your dog
There are many animal lovers who do not think about leaving their pet at home during the holidays and have their dog as a loyal companion to travel with. Therefore, in this article of our blog, we want to give you some reasons why you should choose the Camino de Santiago as the next travel destination for you and your dog.
You won’t have to leave it with anybody
All those people who have decided to share their life with a dog face the same dilemma when the holidays arrive: What do I do with the dog? If you decide to leave it at home or let someone take care of it, besides having to ask for favours from family or friends, your dog will miss your company.
Leaving it at a dog hotel or pet care centre is not an option that is so attractive. Since that implies leaving it in the hands of a stranger and, likewise, the poor animal will miss you.
If you decide to travel on your next vacation on the Camino de Santiago, with your dog you will not have to leave it in anyone’s care at any time. Your pet will be able to accompany you throughout the route.
You can spend as much time as you want on the Camino de Santiago
If you leave your dog at home and go on a trip, during your vacation you will not be able to stop worrying if it will be okay or not, and you will even miss it. Not to mention that if you ask the favour of caring for the dog, you will not abuse the courtesy of your family and friends by being away for a long time.
If you pilgrim to Compostela with your dog, you won’t have that problem. You will be able to devote as much time as you want, or from when you have a longer holiday, to tour the routes on the Camino de Santiago. In this article we talk about how much time is needed to complete the different stages of the Camino, if you wish to read it.
Because it is very easy for your dog to be with you
Unlike other travel destinations, the Camino de Santiago is made up largely by rural surroundings, so you will find no problem for your dog to be with you, during all your holiday. Even if you decide to visit a church on the route, the animal will be able to run around or play around, without fear of losing it, being stolen, or hit by a car.
Obviously, if you choose a stretch on the Camino de Santiago with many cities you will have to be much more attentive to your pet. The good thing about the Camino de Santiago is that its network of itineraries is so wide that, if you want to do a route with few urban stages, you will find many options.
So if you choose the Camino de Santiago as your next travel destination for you and your dog, you will avoid having to leave it tied to the door, while you make more and more visits. In this article we talk about the characteristics of the different sections on the Camino de Santiago routes. Find the right one for you and your dog!
The experience will be much more fun
Dogs always make you live funny and unexpected situations. If you decide to spend your holidays on the Camino de Santiago, next to your dog, you will surely have funnier stories to tell than if you leave it at home. Your photos, surely, will also be much better, or at least, more original.
Your dog will be incredibly happy in nature
One of the reasons why the Camino de Santiago is so famous is because of the nature that surrounds it. If you dare to pilgrimage with your dog, your pet will be very happy sniffing new places and running around. Of course, you’ll be seeing it so happy too.
Because it will be easier to find accommodation
When you travel with a dog, finding accommodation that is dog-friendly can be difficult. On the Camino de Santiago, as more and more people are encouraged to travel with their dog, the number of hostels, hotels and cottages that accept animals, has grown considerably.
You’ll get to know many more people
A dog is always like a magnet, both for children and adults. The fact that it accompanies you on the Camino de Santiago, your dog will help you know even more people than usual on the route.
Also, if you are single, you will be interested to know that if you make the Camino de Santiago with a dog, it will be much easier to flirt. As we told you in this article on our blog, the Camino de Santiago is also known as the route of love.
Of course, at this point, you won’t be the only one who enjoys it. Your dog will also be enormously happy with the caresses and attention that the rest of pilgrims will dedicate to it. It is even possible, that at some point in the tour, you want to be in their skin.
You will travel much more calmly
The Camino de Santiago is a very safe route, as we commented in our article on practical aspects of the pilgrim route. However, if you go with your dog you will feel much calmer, since your loyal partner, especially if it is big, is the best guarantee that nothing will happen to you.
He will always be alert and impose respect! No one will approach you with bad intentions, for fear of being bitten.
Doing the Camino de Santiago with a dog is economical
On many occasions, travelling with your dog makes the holidays considerably more expensive. Among other reasons, because finding accommodation where they accept the animal is not easy.
However, going to Santiago de Compostela with your pet will not be much more expensive than if you do the Camino de Santiago alone. In this article we give you some examples of prices.
They are the perfect companion on the Camino
Your dog will not give you any “ifs or buts” for the route that you choose, nor to the dates. Everything you decide will be fine. Of course, you will also have to worry about your well-being and planning the stages properly, but otherwise, it won’t object to how you plan your trip.
In addition, the Camino de Santiago is an experience that leads you to have many moments of introspection and withdrawal. This fact, sometimes, is a problem for people who do the route within a group, with a partner or with friends, because they are not able to accept that one prefers to travel a stage alone, in silence.
That with your dog won’t happen to you. Is that why it is said that they are man’s best friend?
Your dog will show you the here and now
As we explained in the two articles that we dedicated in our blog on the lessons and teachings on the pilgrim path. No one returns from Compostela without having learned something along the way.
If you decide to go to the Camino de Santiago with your dog, on the trip he will also teach you one thing: to enjoy the moment. Seeing the curiosity that wakes you every new kilometre and how you enjoy the environment, will make you do it too.
Your best friend will help you stay in the here and now. This is without a doubt the main reward that you will take from having shared your pilgrimage with your dog.
Your dog will keep you company on the Camino de Santiago
The Camino is very social, but it also has moments of solitude. Stage endings where there is not much to do, desolate routes in which you cannot find other pilgrims to chat with, etc. No doubt that loneliness is part of the experience of the Camino de Santiago, but if you go with your dog, it will be much more bearable.
Strengthened ties
After sharing the experience of pilgrimage to Santiago with your pet, you will have discovered some of its facets that you did not know. The same thing will have happened to it with you.
After tens and dozens of kilometres walking next to each other, you will have created a much stronger bond. The Camino de Santiago could be the longest walk you’ve ever made with your dog.
The two of you will return much more balanced
Walking is definitely an activity that helps balance emotions. The same thing happens to dogs. Has it ever happened to you that one day you didn’t take it out and the dog was very nervous and restless?
After several days on the Camino de Santiago, both you and your dog will return from a much more relaxed holiday. Think about it, the Camino de Santiago is the ideal travel destination for a dog: walking and sniffing around. What else do you need to be happy?
To finish, just to comment that although the Camino de Santiago can be an ideal holiday to share with your dog, like any trip you do with a pet, it requires more planning than if you do it alone. So, now that we have convinced you to bring your loyal partner, we give you some recommendations to organize your pilgrimage and that of your dog.
To say goodbye, we’d like to ask you two things. The first is to share with your friends on Facebook, so other animal lovers will know that the Camino de Santiago is one of the best travel destinations for their dog too.
The second is that you leave a comment telling us if you have done the Camino de Santiago with your dog before or have organized a similar trip during your holiday. Your experience will surely help many pilgrims to embark on the adventure of travelling with their dog.
Buen Camino!
