Anne and Ed are going on another Camino (‘Caminho” in Portuguese) . We are leaving today to fly to Lisbon to start another long walk. Over the last 12 months we have lost too many of our family and friends. We will be thinking of them and asking them to pray for us as we walk. We will also be thinking and praying for everyone that we hold close to our hearts. A Caminho is really just a long prayer. This Caminho is part of our faith journey as we try to understand who we are and to get closer to God.

 We will be walking through Fatima on May 14th which is the 100th year anniversary + 1 day from the first apparition of Mary to three shepherd children. It was an unplanned happening that our visit coincides with the one hundredth anniversary. Mary’s appearances at Fatima were, however, related to a hoped-for end to WWI, which was the subject of our WWI journey  in Belgium and France in 2014.

After Fatima we will be walking north and will go through the ancient university city of Coimbra. We will take a short break in the walk to visit Peter Brennan and his wife Catarina in Figueiro de Foz. Peter is my nephew Patrick Connerty wife’s brother.

Our next big destination is the city Porto after 6 days of walking. After a 1 day rest we will walk 6 more days to the Portuguese border with Spain – Valenca. We will then walk in Spain to the Atlantic Ocean  and meet some friends from Vigo – Rafael and Marta Portanet and will stay with them for a few days.  (They own the condo below ours in Naples, Florida.)

After Vigo, we will finish our pilgrimage by walking for 4 days into Santiago de Compostela.  (In 2015 we entered Santiago from the east after walking from France across northern Spain.)

From Santiago we will be flying to Barcelona for a few days to see this exciting city for the first time. We are then looking forward to staying in Madrid for a week with 2015 Camino friends Julio Martinez Montero y Luz Perez Palomares. We are looking forward to staying with Julio y Luz in Madrid and exploring the area with their guidance.

From Madrid we will fly to Ireland to visit with our good friends and cousins Mary and Tony Fury in Derry, Northern Ireland and Mary and John Kerins in Ballymote, Republic of Ireland.

We are looking forward to this Caminho and hope that you will share it with us.

Boa Caminho!