El Camino de Santiago or The Way of St. James

The next goal is to hike The Way of St. James, also known in spanish as el camino de Santiago. The scallop shell, typically found on the shores in Galicia, has long been the symbol of the Camino de Santiago. Over the centuries the scallop shell has taken on mythical, metaphorical and practical meaning. Metaphorically, the grooves in the shell, which come together at a single point, represent the various routes pilgrims traveled, eventually arriving at a single destination, the tomb of Saint James in Santiago de Compostela. Practically the shell was the right size for gathering water to drink or for eating out of as a makeshift bowl. Also, because the scallop shell is native to the shores of Galicia, the shell functioned as proof of completion. By having a scallop shell, a pilgrim could almost certainly prove that he or she had finished the pilgrimage and had actually seen the "end of the world" which at that point in history was the Western coast of Spain. This gold and blue image marks the route of The Way.