Southern Cross - 3 weeks
France, Spain and a bit of Portugal (Loire Valley, the Basque Country & Galicia)

On this page, you'll find...

• a presentation of the trip,
• a thumbnail itinerary with links to detailed descriptions of the itineraries that we follow in each of the regions visited, and...
• ...prices and departure dates.
  
  

At the time of the crusades, a Santiago pilgrimage was as meritorious as one to Jerusalem, and a heck of a lot safer.  Pilgrims, Europe’s first tourists, gathered in Paris’s Latin Quarter, where the Cluny Museum is decorated with the iconic scallop shell of Santiago’s patron Saint James.  They then beat a path from abbey to monastery, cathedral to convent, across France and Spain, and to magnificent Santiago.  Where they whooped it up for a while, and then went home.

Not much has changed.  Santiago is still a hopping town.  We loosely follow the historic trail, through the Loire Valley, the Pyrenees and the green lands of northern Spain, as we bike and train over roads still often travelled on foot.

En route are French castles, kings and cuisine; the beautiful beaches, green mountains, and lively nightlife of the Basque Country; the fresh wines and wild, undiscovered scenery of the Miño Valley....  A study in contrast of Europe’s best and least known.