Camino Inglés: Ferrol to Santiago in 5 stages

The Camino Inglés owes its name to the people who invented it: pilgrims from England and Ireland who, in the Middle Ages, avoided the walk across France and Spain and took a ship to the Galician coast instead. They landed in Ferrol or A Coruña and walked from there to the Apostle's tomb. Today it is the fourth most walked routeinto Santiago, with around 30,200 pilgrims in 2025 — roughly 5.7-6% of the total, according to the press figures citing the Pilgrim's Office, and a record for this route. It is still, by a wide margin, a quiet path: nothing like the 100,000-plus a year on the central Portugués. The figures for every route, year by year, are in the pilgrim statistics.

Ferrol or A Coruña: why the start matters

The classic route, and the one this guide covers, starts in Ferrol, with stages adding up to 111.5 km: that is what the five days in the table below give, and exactly the total gronze.com publishes. If you want to see that same split worked out day by day, with the hostels on record at each stop, it is in the five-stage plan from Ferrol. You will see it rounded to 112 km in many places, and 118 km too — which is what our own Camino map said until August 2026, with no source behind it that we could check; now corrected. That distance clears the 100 km the Compostela requires with room to spare, so leaving from Ferrol poses no problem at all.

How to get to Ferrol

The most practical option is the direct Monbus coach from Santiago, 1h20 to 1h30, guide prices of 8-9 € and up to 10 services a day: that is what we recommend. The train, by contrast, requires a change in A Coruña and takes over 2h20, so it is impractical if you are short on time. If you are moving between A Coruña and Ferrol, the direct train between the two takes around 1h10 and costs 5-7 €. All these figures are indicative and worth confirming at monbus.es or renfe.com before travelling. The other starting points — and the common traps of that last leg — are in getting to the start of the Camino.

The five stages at a glance

How many days the Camino Inglés takes

Five is the standard split, and the one this guide follows. But it is not compulsory: the route stretches or compresses according to what your legs will take and the days you have.

• In 6 or 7 days, which is what we recommend if you do not walk often. The natural break is at Neda (14.6-15 km from Ferrol, with a Xunta hostel), which splits the first stage, the longest of the five, in two. Miño, on the second, has every service and does the same job.
• In 5 days, the classic split: days of 15 to 28 km, with two consecutive 24 km stages in the middle of the route.
• In 4 days only if you are trained and have margin: it forces days of around 28 km back to back, exactly on the stretches with the fewest bars and hostels. This is not the place to try long distances for the first time.

What the Camino Inglés costs

Five stages mean four nights on the route — Pontedeume, Betanzos, Hospital de Bruma and Sigüeiro — plus the night before in Ferrol if you arrive the day ahead, which is normal. With a public hostel (10 €) and simple food, the budget we use for the whole Camino in Galicia is 25-35 € a day; moving up to private accommodation or a guesthouse and eating à la carte, it goes to 55-90 €. For five days that is around 125-175 € in the frugal version, plus the 8-9 € coach to Ferrol. Guide prices for 2026.

When to go

May to June and September is when the sums work best: Galician weathergives you fewer surprises than in winter and the route stays quiet. July and August concentrate most of the year's pilgrims, which on a route with a hostel network as tight as this one shows more than on the Francés. In winter the problem is not the rain — it rains all year in Galicia — but the services: there are guesthouses and roadside bars that close out of season, so it is worth phoning ahead before counting on a particular stop. The month-by-month calendar is in when the Camino opens and closes.

Where to sleep: the Xunta's public network

As on the other Galician routes, the Xunta's public hostel network charges a standard 10 €/night, takes no bookings and works on a first-come basis. They open at 13:00 and close at 22:00. The difference from the Francés or the Portugués is that the network here is tighter: on some stretches the only public hostel is halfway through the stage, and if it fills you can end up without a bed, with no plan B on the route.

Xacobeo 2027 — the next Holy Year, with the Holy Door open from 31 December 2026 — will be felt here too: if you plan to walk that year, expect more people than usual and book the private hostels on the stages with fewest public beds. The full calendar is in the Xacobeo 2027 guide.