Pilgrimage, walking, art and making a guide
Wild Walk Memories - El Hierro Pilgrimage, Emma Arthur, 2015
El Hierro Pilgrimage - Virgen de los Reyes
I changed the art on this entry to my own work. This collage combines four photographs which represent some of my memories from the pilgrimage I walked over Christmas 2014.
Original images
It is a pilgrimage I have wanted to do for many years and in December I managed to complete the challenging route.
The inhabitants of the remotest and smallest Canary Island have taken part in a religious pilgrimage for three centuries. The pilgrimage 'Virgen de los Reye's starts at the Sanctuary of the Virgen de los Reyes. From there the trail is steep uphill to the highest point on the island, Pico de Malpaso, 1501 metres above sea level. Eventually the pilgrims reach the end point of their journey, the Church of Nuestra Señora de la Concepción, which is the mother church of the island, in Valverde.
This occassion occurs on one day in July but due to the challenging route not everyone can take part in the walk. However, there are many things to do and see from religious art and artifacts, special dances, traditional costumes, songs and of course, food.
This particular pilgrimage will be written up as a guide by my publishing company, www.frifot.com, I have therefore included my notes and the map below to show the process I use for notetaking.
The notes are written on a printout of the area obtained from www.openstreetmap.org which is open source and as long as openstreetmap is credited, the map can be used as a basis for producing more detailed maps. The map only shows one half of the first day which in total was a four hour walk. This always takes longer due to taking photographs and writing notes. Sometimes walking the wrong way means extra time used too. Not all routes are easy to follow.
Photographs
I have included below a few photographs I took on the day of the first route. In all around 40 were taken. A combination of the notes and photographs will be used to produce thefinal guide for the pilgrimage. My partner also takes his own notes with the use of a GPS.
Below the photographs is an example of the guide that will be produced. I designed the pages and front cover for the guides while my partner works on the maps and other map related tasks. I am also responsible for taking the photographs. Note that the pages below have been reduced in size so that two facing pages can be included. More information about the guides are on our website mentioned above. Writing walking guides for the Norwegian walker is a niche market but there is little competition.
References
Art and Pilgrimage, http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195396584/obo-9780195396584-0106.xml
Camino de la virgen de los reyes, http://atlantidea.net/Default.asp?page=607-146
El-hierro forecast for the edge of europhttp://www.independent.co.uk/travel/europe/el-hierro-forecast-for-the-edge-of-europe-9422393.html
Kreiner, N. C. (2010) Researching Pilgrimage: Continuity and Transformations, Annals of Tourism Research, Vol. 37, No. 2, pp. 440–45.
Mitchell E. (2014) Contemporary art meets medieval pilgrimage at rural Lincolnshire church, University of Lincoln, News Archive http://www.lincoln.ac.uk/news/2014/05/895.asp
Sorabella, J. Pilgrimage in Medieval Europe, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/pilg/hd_pilg.htm
Virgen de los Reyes (El Hierro), http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgen_de_los_Reyes_(El_Hierro)
