---
title: "Camino del Norte: the 36 stages, the real climb and the boats"
description: "820-831 km from Irún over 36 stages: distance and ascent for each one, the four water crossings, and why Baamonde leaves 500 m of margin for the Compostela."
url: https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/norte
locale: en
---

# Camino del Norte: the 36 stages, the real climb and the boats

The Camino routes

Eight hundred and twenty kilometres hard against the Bay of Biscay and sixteen thousand metres of climbing. The thirty-six days with their ascent, the four water crossings, the villages with no bed in them, and the hundred-kilometre trap nobody mentions.

[By Cesar Rodriguez · local guide](https://santiago.es/en/author)

![El faro de Fisterra sobre los acantilados del Atlántico, grabado dorado](https://santiago.es/img/illus/faro.jpg)

[© santiago.es · Ilustración](https://santiago.es)

Updated 25 August 2026.

Most people reach the Camino del Norte by elimination: they want the Francés without the crowds, and they see a line that runs along the coast. The coast is real, and the sea views are the most constant of any route. What is not real is the idea of a stroll. In total the Norte climbs more than twice what the Primitivo climbs, it has four water crossings you have to solve yourself, and an albergue network so uneven that the problem is never how many beds the village has, but that the next albergue is fifteen kilometres further on. This guide is about that, with the numbers in front of you.

## The short answer

It is **between 820 and 831 km from Irún**, split into **36 stages** to Santiago: 34 as far as Arzúa, where the Norte joins the Camino Francés, and two more along the final stretch shared with everyone walking in from Sarria. With one rest day a week that comes to **five or six weeks**. In 2025 it was walked by **21,521 pilgrims**, 4.05% of the total, according to the official dashboard of the Oficina de Acogida al Peregrino, the Pilgrim's Office: it is the **sixth busiest route**, behind the Primitivo.

The number you see everywhere, ~34 stages, belongs to something else

The 34 stages quoted almost everywhere, our own routes table included until today, **get you to Arzúa, not to Santiago**. That is 781.6 km. To reach the Cathedral you add two more days, which makes **36 stages and 820.3 km** adding up the table further down.

And the total has no single figure either. Gronze writes «784 kilometres» in the text of its last stage, but adding up its own stage entries gives 781.6 to Arzúa; and its article on the fork implies around 831 km to Santiago. The difference comes from which variants you count (Tol or Tapia de Casariego, Miraz or As Cruces). That is why we publish a range, **820-831 km**, and not a round number: there is no round number.

## The Camino del Norte is not growing, which is the opposite of what you are told

The line the tourism sites repeat is that the Norte is gaining ground among people escaping the crowds on the Francés. The official data says the opposite, and it has been saying it for nine years. In 2016 the Norte was 6.22% of all pilgrims; in 2025 it was 4.05%; so far in 2026, 3.81%. It is not falling in absolute numbers: it is **growing far more slowly than the Camino as a whole**, and in 2026 not even that.

**Camino del Norte pilgrims and share of the total (Pilgrim's Office dashboard, read on 25 August 2026)**

| Year | Norte pilgrims | Camino total | Share |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 2016 | 17,289 | 277,854 | 6.22% |
| 2019 | 19,021 | 347,566 | 5.47% |
| 2022 | 20,814 | 437,589 | 4.76% |
| 2023 | 20,583 | 446,082 | 4.61% |
| 2024 | 21,416 | 499,162 | 4.29% |
| 2025 | 21,521 | 530,842 | 4.05% |
| 2026, to 23 August | 14,228 | 373,590 | 3.81% |

The cleanest comparison is like for like: from **January to July**, the Norte went from 11,478 pilgrims in 2025 to **11,241 in 2026**, down 2.1%, while the Camino as a whole was up 5.5%. Anyone looking for solitude finds more of it on the Norte today than five years ago. Anyone expecting a route in fashion will not find one.

## Sixteen thousand metres of climbing: the Norte against the Primitivo

The Primitivo has the reputation for being hard, and it has earned it day by day. But what wears you down on a five-week walk is the cumulative climb, and there the two are not close. Adding up the stage table on this page, the Norte accumulates **16,239 metres of ascent** and 15,757 of descent. The Primitivo, from Oviedo to Melide, accumulates 6,937.

**Elevation compared, our own sums over Gronze data**

|  | Camino del Norte | Camino Primitivo (Oviedo–Melide) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Cumulative ascent | 16,239 m | 6,937 m |
| Distance | 820.3 km | 253-258 km |
| Intensity | 19.8 m of ascent per km | 27.4 m per km |
| Average per stage | 22.8 km and 451 m of ascent | 23.0 km and 630 m of ascent |

The honest way to put it: **the Primitivo is harder per day and the Norte is harder in total**. People who come to the Norte from the Francés get their fright in the first week. The seven stages from Irún to Bilbao are 147.3 km with 4,322 metres of ascent, which is **29.3 metres per kilometre** — steeper even than the Primitivo average. After that the profile calms down, but never completely.

## The 36 stages, with the climb on each one

Distances, ascent, descent and walking time from Gronze, the reference nearly everyone planning in Spanish uses. Stages 35 and 36 are already Camino Francés: you share the path and the albergues with people walking from Sarria.

**Camino del Norte stages from Irún to Santiago, with cumulative elevation (source: Gronze, read 25 August 2026)**

| Stage | Km | Ascent | Descent | Time |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1. Irún – San Sebastián | 24.7 | 630 m | 651 m | 7 h 15 |
| 2. San Sebastián – Zarautz | 22.1 | 546 m | 543 m | 6 h 00 |
| 3. Zarautz – Deba | 21.0 | 772 m | 771 m | 5 h 45 |
| 4. Deba – Markina-Xemein | 23.3 | 817 m | 743 m | 6 h 15 |
| 5. Markina-Xemein – Gernika | 25.4 | 679 m | 762 m | 6 h 45 |
| 6. Gernika – Lezama | 19.8 | 560 m | 503 m | 5 h 30 |
| 7. Lezama – Bilbao | 11.0 | 318 m | 369 m | 3 h 15 |
| 8. Bilbao – Portugalete | 19.2 | 444 m | 431 m | 4 h 45 |
| 9. Portugalete – Castro Urdiales | 32.1 | 465 m | 464 m | 8 h 30 |
| 10. Castro Urdiales – Laredo | 30.5 | 712 m | 709 m | 7 h 45 |
| 11. Laredo – Güemes | 28.7 | 305 m | 245 m | 7 h 15 |
| 12. Güemes – Santander | 15.3 | 126 m | 210 m | 3 h 45 |
| 13. Santander – Santillana del Mar | 36.3 | 408 m | 328 m | 9 h 15 |
| 14. Santillana del Mar – Comillas | 22.2 | 461 m | 523 m | 5 h 30 |
| 15. Comillas – Colombres | 28.0 | 529 m | 451 m | 7 h 00 |
| 16. Colombres – Llanes | 22.9 | 319 m | 416 m | 6 h 00 |
| 17. Llanes – Ribadesella | 30.0 | 333 m | 340 m | 7 h 45 |
| 18. Ribadesella – Colunga | 20.1 | 341 m | 327 m | 5 h 15 |
| 19. Colunga – Villaviciosa | 17.5 | 305 m | 319 m | 4 h 30 |
| 20. Villaviciosa – Gijón | 29.8 | 655 m | 654 m | 8 h 00 |
| 21. Gijón – Avilés | 25.4 | 258 m | 253 m | 6 h 30 |
| 22. Avilés – Muros de Nalón | 21.2 | 549 m | 419 m | 5 h 15 |
| 23. Muros de Nalón – Soto de Luiña | 15.3 | 437 m | 543 m | 3 h 45 |
| 24. Soto de Luiña – Cadavedo | 18.5 | 582 m | 512 m | 5 h 00 |
| 25. Cadavedo – Luarca | 15.3 | 219 m | 296 m | 3 h 45 |
| 26. Luarca – La Caridad | 30.5 | 521 m | 463 m | 7 h 30 |
| 27. La Caridad – Ribadeo | 21.3 | 206 m | 227 m | 5 h 15 |
| 28. Ribadeo – Gondán | 20.9 | 602 m | 457 m | 5 h 15 |
| 29. Gondán – Mondoñedo | 15.6 | 451 m | 506 m | 4 h 00 |
| 30. Mondoñedo – Abadín | 16.6 | 625 m | 251 m | 4 h 15 |
| 31. Abadín – Vilalba | 20.8 | 250 m | 290 m | 5 h 15 |
| 32. Vilalba – Baamonde | 18.5 | 209 m | 273 m | 4 h 30 |
| 33. Baamonde – Sobrado dos Monxes | 39.8 | 599 m | 497 m | 10 h 15 |
| 34. Sobrado dos Monxes – Arzúa | 22.0 | 337 m | 219 m | 5 h 30 |
| 35. Arzúa – O Pedrouzo | 19.3 | 351 m | 447 m | 4 h 30 |
| 36. O Pedrouzo – Santiago | 19.4 | 318 m | 345 m | 4 h 30 |

Two honest warnings about this table, because we would rather say them than hide them. On stage 34, Sobrado–Arzúa, Gronze prints the two elevation figures in the reverse order to the rest of its entries; we have taken 337 m as the ascent for consistency with the profile, but **it is not confirmed**. And stage 8 has a flat variant along the estuary of 13.0 km that swallows 6.2 of the official 19.2: if you take it, the total drops.

This table has an expiry date, and we know what it is

On 17 March 2026 the Xunta put out for public consultation a plan to **change the route of the Camino del Norte in ten councils** in Lugo and A Coruña: Ribadeo, Trabada, Vilalba, Begonte, Guitiriz, Friol, Sobrado, Boimorto, Arzúa and O Pino. It is 40 million euros over more than 150 km, due for delivery by the [Xacobeo 2027](https://santiago.es/en/xacobeo-2027).

Which means **stages 28 to 36 in this table are going to move**: O Pino, the last concello on that list, is where the final day walks into Santiago. When they do, we will update it here; in the meantime it is worth checking the Galician section against the waymarking on the ground.

## The five sections that actually cost you

They are not the longest ones, and that is the surprising part.

### 1. Deba – Markina-Xemein (23.3 km, 817 m of ascent)

This is the stage with the most ascent on the whole route. The Arno pass is 300 metres of climb in barely 3 kilometres. Gronze describes it as the loneliest stage of the Camino del Norte, with almost nothing open in between: **15.6 km between Olatz and Markina**, with a single fountain on the way, at Arnoate, and it is not drinking water. The bar in Olatz opens at 10 am and **closes on Mondays**, so on a Monday the real gap from Laranga is 20.2 km. And from the Calvario chapel onwards you do not see the sea again until Portugalete: anyone who came for the coastal photographs takes the disappointment here.

### 2. The Jaizkibel climb, on day one (24.7 km, 630 m)

First day out and it is already leg-breaking ground over Jaizkibel and Ulía. There are **11.6 km with nothing open at all**, from the Guadalupe sanctuary to Pasajes de San Juan, and the only fountain is at the start of that gap. At the end there is a climb of some 312 steps up to the La Plata lighthouse. The mountain variant along the ridge goes over the Allerru at 547 metres, and Gronze itself calls that one hard and lonely.

### 3. Castro Urdiales – Laredo (30.5 km, 712 m)

Up and down all day, the second biggest climb of the route and long with it. The warning here is not about legs but about traffic: leaving Cerdigo you cross the main road on a three-lane straight, with no crossing and fast cars. Gronze specifically advises against the shortcut along the hard shoulder of the N-634, which saves 5.6 km.

### 4. Baamonde – Sobrado dos Monxes (39.8 km)

The longest stage of the Camino, and Gronze says so flatly: too long for ordinary mortals. It opens with **12.2 km to the first bar**, at Seixón, and there is another gap of 9.1 km later on. A Cabana has a Xunta albergue, but no shop and no bar in the village. The alternative is to break the stage by sleeping in Miraz, where the Confraternity of Saint James albergue has **20 beds on a donation basis** and takes no bookings.

### 5. Mondoñedo – Abadín (16.6 km, 625 m)

The most concentrated climb on the route: **625 metres of ascent over 16.6 km**, close to 38 metres per kilometre, hauling from 140 to 560 metres of altitude. And as much as **13.2 km with nothing listed**, from Maariz to Gontán. Gronze advises against the main hill route, 3.6 km shorter, if you are alone or the weather is bad: empty country, loose cattle and frequent fog.

Outside those five, what grinds you down is tarmac. Santillana del Mar–Comillas is on asphalt almost the whole way; Santander–Santillana runs along pavements and pedestrian lanes through built-up areas; and Gijón–Avilés is one of the least rewarding sections of the entire Camino, between motorways and steelworks. One safety warning with a name on it: on Avilés–Muros de Nalón, the official route through Piedras Blancas forces you to walk a kilometre along the AS-320 with no hard shoulder and heavy traffic. Gronze calls it very dangerous and recommends the variant via San Martín de Laspra.

## The fork with the Primitivo is not at Sebrayo

Almost everyone says the Norte and the Primitivo separate at Sebrayo, and they do not. The physical marker, with two scallop shells on it, is at **Casquita**, a hamlet beside the San Blas chapel, at **kilometre 3.7 of the stage out of Villaviciosa**. Straight on takes you towards Gijón on the Norte; left takes you towards Oviedo on the Primitivo.

The confusion has an explanation: Sebrayo is on the previous stage and has an albergue, so people sleep there and decide there, but the sign is 5.6 km further on. Sebrayo is also a tiny hamlet with nothing permanent open, **10 beds at €5** and a shop-in-a-van that comes round late in the afternoon.

**Kilometres from the fork to Santiago, by option**

| Option | Gronze (from Villaviciosa) | Stage sum (from Casquita) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Carry on to the Primitivo via Oviedo | 354 km | 345.6 km |
| Stay on the Norte via Gijón | ~381 km | 366.5 km |
| Visit Oviedo and rejoin the Norte at Avilés | 398.5 km | — |

The gap between the two main options is **21 to 27 km and one or two days**, in the Primitivo's favour. Today most people go via Oviedo, to the point that Gronze itself lists the linking stages as little walked. What you gain by staying on the Norte is the western Asturian coast and considerably fewer people from there on. What you pay is that the continuation opens with **Villaviciosa–Gijón**, 29.8 km and 655 metres of ascent, with two ramps of 340 and 200 metres and an entry into Gijón that Gronze calls a muddle because the waymarking is poor.

## The Oviedo variant: 837-849 km

There is a third option almost nobody publishes: **go to Oviedo and come back to the Norte**. You do not take it in Oviedo, you take it at the same Casquita fork, turning left but hooking back to the coast at Avilés. The sequence is Villaviciosa–Pola de Siero (26.0 km, 541 m), Pola de Siero–Oviedo (17.3 km, 175 m) and Oviedo–Avilés (29.0 km, 591 m).

Seeing Oviedo and returning to the Norte costs about **17.5 km extra** compared with going straight on via Gijón, which puts the total for the walk between **837 and 849 km** depending on how you count. It is the figure that appears in no comparison table anywhere. Against it: Pola de Siero–Oviedo is mostly on asphalt, with some 5 km of industrial estate before the old town, and the link has few services on the way; the bar-restaurant at La Carcabada closes on Thursdays and the one at Vega de Sariego on Tuesdays.

## The four water crossings, and which ones are really boats

This is the part of the Norte that gets explained worst. There are four points where the Camino meets water, and only three of them are crossed by boat. None of them is blocked by the tide, but **one does depend on the depth of the channel**, and that is the part nobody tells you.

**The four water crossings of the Camino del Norte**

| Where | What it is | Indicative price | Alternative on foot |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Pasajes de San Juan → San Pedro (stage 1) | Small ferry, every 5-10 min, all year | €1.85-1.95 | None |
| Getxo → Portugalete (stage 8, estuary variant only) | Puente Bizkaia, the hanging gondola, 24 h | €0.45-0.70 | The official stage via Barakaldo does not cross |
| Laredo → Santoña | Barca del Puntal, seasonal | €2.00-2.50 | Inland detour via Colindres, 4.1 km more |
| Somo → Santander | Los Reginas, 365 days a year, 20 min | €4.00 one way | Detour via Solares and Astillero, road almost all the way |

The Somo detail that is in no guide

The Santander operator warns at the top of its timetables that, because of **insufficient depth on the Pedreña-Somo leg**, some sailings only reach Pedreña and **do not leave from Somo**. It is not that the boat is not running that day: it is that that particular sailing does not stop where you are standing. And the timetables change every few days.

The practical conclusion: **do not trust any timetable published in advance, ours included if we ever put one up**. You check losreginas.com the night before. The alternative on foot is genuinely bad: road nearly all the way and the albergue in Astillero closed.

The Laredo one is the other case with a catch: **it does not run in winter** and you have to make the detour via Colindres. The sources disagree on both the season and the price (the operator says €2.50 and publishes no calendar; Laredo tourism says €2.00 and mid-March to mid-November), so in March or November it is worth phoning. And the Ribadeo estuary, the way into Galicia, **has no boat and does not depend on the tide**: you walk across the Puente de los Santos, along a narrow pedestrian lane between the motorway and the water. Gronze calls it deplorable and extraordinary, but notes that it is not dangerous because it is protected by barriers and a railing. Anyone who cannot face it has the historic variant via Vegadeo, inland and well waymarked.

## Where there is nothing, and where there is no bed

Gronze publishes one structural figure worth having before you leave: from Irún to Arzúa the Norte passes through **133 places with services**, one every 5.9 km on average. The average lies, as averages do. These are the gaps that are actually long, all of them checked stage by stage.

**Sections with no bar or shop on the Camino del Norte**

| Section | Km with no services | Note |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vilela → San Xusto | 16.8 | The longest on the route, and it is the first Galician stage |
| Gernika → Larrabetzu | 16.0 | Two fountains, but not one bar |
| Olatz → Markina | 15.6 | 20.2 km on Mondays, when the Olatz bar shuts |
| Maariz → Gontán (the Mondoñedo stage) | 13.2 | Gronze lists 17.0 km from Mondoñedo, which is more than the whole stage |
| San Xoán de Alba → the A-6 | 13.3 | Mondays only, when the Pedrouzos bar shuts |
| Baamonde → Seixón | 12.2 | The start of the 39.8 km stage |
| Guadalupe → Pasajes de San Juan | 11.6 | Day one |

And a negative result that is also useful for planning: the three long Cantabrian stages (Portugalete–Castro 32.1 km, Castro–Laredo 30.5 and Santander–Santillana 36.3) **have no gap longer than 10 km**. They are hard because of the distance and the tarmac, not because of food and water.

### Beds: the problem is not capacity, it is the distance between albergues

On the Camino Francés, if an albergue is full you carry on to the next village. On the Norte, the next albergue can be fifteen kilometres away. That is the mechanism, and it is not the one the forums describe.

**Beds at the bottlenecks of the Camino del Norte**

| Place | Beds | Price | Season |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Deba (inside the station building) | 56 | €8, no booking | All year |
| Zarautz | None | — | No albergue |
| Getaria (two private) | 12 + 10 | €20-35 | March to October |
| Markina (Convento del Carmen) | 41 | €15 | 13 Mar – 18 Oct |
| Lezama | 10 | €10 | 1 Jun – 30 Sep |
| Castro Urdiales | 16 | — | Not enough in high season |
| Güemes (La Cabaña del Abuelo Peuto) | 70 | Donation, no booking | All year |
| San Esteban de Leces (for Ribadesella) | 47 | €15 | All year |
| Sebrayo | 10 | €5 | All year |
| Miraz (Confraternity of Saint James) | 20 | Donation, no booking | 1 Apr – early Nov |
| Sobrado dos Monxes (monastery) | 98 | €10, no booking | All year |

Five things in that table that change how you plan:

- **Zarautz has no albergue and is not going to get one.** The public Ebro Etxea is not reopening: the beds were moved to Zumaia. What is left are surf hostels at €25-29. And the plan B, Getaria 4 km away, **adds only 22 beds across its two places**. Zarautz and Getaria together give you no cushion.
- **Lezama is the sharpest bottleneck in the Basque Country**: 10 beds, and only from 1 June to 30 September. It is the natural end of the stage out of Gernika, so it is the only destination of the day.
- **Ribadesella has no albergue.** The one at San Esteban de Leces is 5.1 km from the centre, uphill, in a hamlet with nothing open. If you sleep there you are not having dinner in Ribadesella.
- **Two municipal albergues that no longer exist and that people still look for**: Santillana del Mar closed in 2023 with no reopening date, and Comillas in 2019. Comillas now has only a private one at €23-27.
- **The cheap albergues that are left are exactly the ones that fill up.** Deba at €8, Sebrayo at €5, Güemes and Miraz on donation. And none of those four takes bookings.

The villages most often reported full on the forums are **Deba** (first by a distance), Markina, San Sebastián, Castro Urdiales, Islares, Gernika, Gijón and Luarca. The budget goes up too: in the Basque Country private albergues run from €22 to €27 on average, against the €10 of a Galician public one, and in San Sebastián in summer without a booking you will be asked more than €50 for a bunk. That is the real reason the Norte works out dearer than the Francés, and it is concentrated in the first three weeks.

The Galician public albergues on the Norte cannot be booked

From Ribadeo on you are in the Xunta network, and it works to different rules: €10 per person per night, **no booking possible under any circumstances**, doors open from 1 pm to 10 pm, one night only unless something goes badly wrong, and you have to be out before 8 am. If a booking site shows nothing in Baamonde or A Cabana, **that does not mean there are no beds**: it means that albergue cannot be booked anywhere.

## The last 100 km trap

This is the worst-answered question on the whole Camino del Norte, and the answers repeated most often on the forums are simply false: there are threads recommending you start in Lugo, which **is not on the Norte** at all, it is on the Primitivo. These are the real distances to Santiago, worked out from the stage table on this page.

**Distance to Santiago from the starting points on the final section**

| Town | Km to Santiago | Enough for the Compostela? |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Sobrado dos Monxes | 60.7 | No |
| Baamonde | 100.5 | Yes on foot, by 500 metres |
| Vilalba | 119.0 | Yes, on foot |
| Mondoñedo | 156.4 | Yes, on foot |
| Ribadeo | 192.9 | Yes on foot; NO by bicycle |
| La Caridad | 214.2 | Yes, by bicycle too |

Two traps nobody warns you about

**One.** Baamonde leaves you **100.5 km**: fifty metres of margin for every kilometre. And if from Baamonde you take the As Cruces variant (32.0 km instead of the 39.8 of the stage via Miraz, which is exactly what you do if you do not want to walk forty kilometres), the total drops to **92.7 km and you lose the Compostela**. The guides describe the variant as shorter and never mention the consequence.

**Two.** By bicycle you need 200 km, and **Ribadeo comes to 192.9**. It is the natural gateway to Galicia and the third most used starting point on the Norte, with 9.5% of pilgrims. The first valid place for cyclists is **La Caridad, 214.2 km**, still in Asturias. All of it is explained in [our guide to the Compostela](https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/compostela-certificate).

Baamonde has a physical 100 km marker, a hostal called Km101 and a **regional railway station**, so it works perfectly well as a starting point. Even so, the official statistics say that **more people start in Vilalba (11.3%) than in Baamonde (4.1%)**, nearly three times as many, very probably because the 39.8 km stage out of Baamonde frightens them off.

## It rains, and we can tell you how much

The Norte is pure oceanic climate: Atlantic fronts hit the Cordillera Cantábrica, which sits right against the sea, the air rises and unloads. The meseta the Francés crosses is in the lee. Translated into rain days, using AEMET normals for 1981-2010, that looks like this:

**Rain days per year and in August, the Norte against the Camino Francés (AEMET, 1981-2010)**

| Station | Annual rainfall | Rain days a year | Rain days in August |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| San Sebastián (Igeldo) | 1,507 mm | 141.1 | 10.5 |
| Bilbao airport | 1,134 mm | 124.0 | 7.9 |
| Santander airport | 1,129 mm | 123.6 | 7.6 |
| Oviedo | 960 mm | 122.3 | 7.8 |
| Santiago airport (the destination) | 1,787 mm | 139.5 | 5.5 |
| Burgos (Camino Francés) | 546 mm | 83.5 | 3.4 |
| León (Camino Francés) | 515 mm | 74.9 | 2.7 |

In August, the busiest month for pilgrims, San Sebastián gets rain on **almost four times as many days as León**. Over the year it is 141 days against 75. The dry months in the north are July and August, and even then it rains one day in three in Gipuzkoa. October and November are the worst. Gronze sums up the practical consequence well: in the wet, **mud is a more serious problem than the climbs**. If you want the detail for the end of the walk, it is in [our guide to the weather in Santiago](https://santiago.es/en/weather).

## Who walks the Norte

The profile is different too, and there are two figures published nowhere else because you have to cross-filter the official dashboard to get them.

The first: **the Norte is the genuinely French camino**, in the sense of nationality. The French are 5.6% of pilgrims on the Norte against 1.9% of the Camino as a whole, nearly triple their usual weight. It makes sense: Bayonne and Hendaye are the way in. Behind them come the Dutch (2.4% against 1.3%) and the Germans (7.9% against 4.6%). Italians, by contrast, are barely over-represented, and the Portuguese, Irish and Brazilians are conspicuously absent: people who arrive via the Portugués do not touch the Norte.

The second: **the Norte is the male route**. It runs 56.7% men to 43.3% women, the exact reverse of the Camino as a whole, where women have been the majority for years at 53.4%. And 10.8% do it by bicycle, well above the average.

Finally, where people start: **only one in four sets off from Irún** (25.4%). After that come Vilalba (11.3%), Ribadeo (9.5%), Bilbao (6.0%), San Sebastián (5.3%), Gijón (5.0%), Santander (4.5%) and Baamonde (4.1%). The whole Norte is a minority even within the Norte.

## Frequently asked questions

**How long is the Camino del Norte?**

Between 820 and 831 km from Irún to Santiago, depending on which variants you count. Adding up the Gronze stages gives 820.3 km over 36 days. The «34 stages» quoted everywhere reach Arzúa (781.6 km), not Santiago. If you visit Oviedo and rejoin the Norte at Avilés, the total rises to 837-849 km.

**Is the Camino del Norte harder than the Francés?**

Much harder. It accumulates 16,239 metres of ascent, against a Francés with only one genuinely demanding day, the one over Roncesvalles. The first week of the Norte, Irún to Bilbao, climbs 4,322 metres in 147 km: 29.3 metres per kilometre. And it rains on almost twice as many days a year as on the meseta.

**Is the Camino del Norte harder than the Primitivo?**

It depends how you measure, and both answers are true. The Primitivo is steeper per day (27.4 metres of ascent per kilometre against 19.8). The Norte climbs more than twice as much in total: 16,239 metres against the 6,937 of the Primitivo from Oviedo to Melide, because it lasts twice as many days.

**Where do you have to start the Camino del Norte to get the Compostela?**

From Baamonde, which is 100.5 km from Santiago: only 500 metres of margin. Watch out for the As Cruces variant out of Baamonde, because it shortens the walk to 92.7 km and leaves you without the certificate. By bicycle you need 200 km and Ribadeo falls short at 192.9: the first valid point is La Caridad, at 214.2 km.

**Do you need to book albergues on the Camino del Norte?**

In the Basque Country and Cantabria, in July and August, it is worth it. The problem is not how many beds the village has but that the next albergue can be fifteen kilometres away: Zarautz has no albergue, Lezama has ten beds and only from June to September, and Ribadesella has none either. In Galicia, on the other hand, the Xunta public albergues take no bookings under any circumstances: €10, first come first served.

**How many boats do you have to take on the Camino del Norte?**

Three, and a bridge. The Pasajes ferry on day one, the Barca del Puntal between Laredo and Santoña (which does not run in winter; the detour via Colindres is 4.1 km more) and Los Reginas from Somo to Santander, which runs all year but has sailings that skip Somo because the channel is too shallow. The fourth crossing, the Bilbao estuary, is the Puente Bizkaia, and only the variant along the estuary takes it.

**Where do the Camino del Norte and the Primitivo separate?**

At the hamlet of Casquita, at kilometre 3.7 of the stage out of Villaviciosa, beside the San Blas chapel and marked with a two-shell waymark. Not at Sebrayo, which is on the previous stage and is where a lot of people sleep before deciding.

**How many people walk the Camino del Norte?**

21,521 pilgrims in 2025, 4.05% of the total, according to the official Pilgrim's Office dashboard. It is the sixth busiest route. And contrary to what gets repeated, it is not growing: its share has been falling for nine years, from 6.22% in 2016 to 3.81% so far in 2026.

**When is the best time to walk the Camino del Norte?**

June, July and August are the least wet months, although in Gipuzkoa it still rains one day in three. September works too and has fewer people. October and November are the worst for rain, and in winter the Laredo boat stops and much of the accommodation in the Basque Country and Cantabria closes.

Keep reading

**[All the Camino routes](https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/routes)** — Comparison — The eight routes to Santiago — plus the one that leaves it — with distances, stages, difficulty and what share of pilgrims walks each. — Read the guide

**[Camino Primitivo](https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/primitivo)** — The fork — The other way out of Casquita: twenty-odd kilometres less, more climbing per day and the Hospitales route. — Read the guide

**[The Compostela and the credencial](https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/compostela-certificate)** — The certificate — The 100 continuous kilometres, the 200 by bike, and why Ribadeo does not count if you are cycling. — Read the guide

**[The last 100 km](https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/last-100-km)** — The final stretch — From Arzúa the last two days of the Norte are shared with the Francés, and that is the busiest part of the walk. — Read the guide

**[How many pilgrims reach Santiago](https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/pilgrim-statistics)** — The numbers — Figures by route, by month and by country, from the Pilgrim's Office. — Read the guide

**[Arriving in Santiago](https://santiago.es/en/camino-de-santiago/arriving)** — The last day — The pilgrim mass, the Pilgrim's Office and why the botafumeiro is out of action. — Read the guide