Biarritz, France: Where the Journey Begins

San Fermín Camino | Part One
By Michael Rucker

Every time I thought my legs had nothing left, the Atlantic appeared.

That is how I remember training in the Basque Country in 2022, walking the hills around Bilbao and San Sebastián before my first Camino. A steep climb, a sudden change in weather, a stretch where I wondered what I had gotten myself into, and then the sea would open up below me as if the land had been waiting to reward the effort. I remember the beauty of those days as clearly as I remember the exhaustion. I didn't fully appreciate it then, but beauty and difficulty are often traveling companions, and the Basque Country was already teaching me lessons I would carry home from the Camino.

Where the Mountains Meet the Atlantic

I have loved this corner of France and Spain ever since. It is a place where the mountains meet the Atlantic, fishing villages cling to the coastline, and the people seem to possess an ancient understanding of what it means to belong to a place. The beaches are magnificent, the food is a celebration, and there is a ruggedness to the landscape and a warmth to the people that I find irresistible. I have returned several times over the years, and each visit has deepened my affection for it.

Now I get to return once more, this time with a group of men who will share an adventure I hope stays with them for the rest of their lives.

In July 2027, I will return with ten men and a fellow guide for an eleven-day journey from the French Basque Country, across the Pyrenees, through the celebration of San Fermín, and into the wine country of La Rioja. This is the first of four letters about that journey, and I can think of no better place to begin than Biarritz.

Giving Ourselves Permission to Begin

Our San Fermín Camino starts in Biarritz, a lovely French coastal town that has welcomed travelers for generations. For those arriving from Paris, I can't think of a better introduction than the train south through the French countryside. There is something civilized about traveling by train, watching the landscape pass as the urgency of ordinary life begins to loosen its grip. Those hours can become a way of making room for whatever this journey might bring. There is no need to arrive with answers or even a clear sense of why you have come. Sometimes the most important thing we can do is give ourselves permission to begin.

I have come to believe that a Camino begins long before the first step. Sometimes it begins with a question we have been afraid to ask, a loss we haven't quite made peace with, or the quiet realization that the life we have been living is asking something more of us. Other times it begins with nothing more complicated than a desire for adventure, friendship and the pleasure of discovering someplace new. All of those reasons are welcome, and none is more important than another. What the Camino offers is time and space, two things that have become hard to find in our busy lives, and what matters is the willingness to show up and let the experience become your own.

Our First Evening Together

We will spend our first evening together in Biarritz, walking the waterfront, wandering the streets, sharing a good meal and beginning the conversations that will deepen over the days ahead. Some of us will arrive knowing one another, and others will be meeting for the first time. I love the thought of that first dinner: the stories, the laughter, the anticipation. There is something special about the beginning of a shared journey, when everyone is still a little uncertain, everyone is carrying his own expectations, and no one knows how it will unfold.

From the Coast to the Camino

The next day, we'll leave the Atlantic behind and travel inland toward the Pyrenees, where the mountains rise above the villages and the ancient road to Santiago waits. We will trade the easy elegance of the French coast for a small mountain village that has welcomed pilgrims for centuries, and a landscape that will ask something of each of us. I know that road, and I know a little of what waits there. What excites me most is experiencing it again through the eyes of men seeing it for the first time.

Come Walk With Us

This is a gay men's Camino, led by Camino Más Allá and Fellow Travelers, July 2 to 12, 2027, with room for ten pilgrims. Learn more details online, and if you're curious, let's talk about your Camino.

Come walk with us.