[burntwater]

Last fall I hiked 500 miles of a Camino trail in Spain. It was a fantastic experience and really made me wish we had something similar in the U.S. This is a good start, though the trail itself is only half the picture. To replicate the Camino experience you also need the network of cheap hostels every ~10 miles and the community and safety aspects that, sadly, I suspect would be lacking in the U.S.

[VyseofArcadia]

Does the Appalachian Trail not count?

[burntwater]

I haven't done it myself, but everything I've seen says the AT is a completely different kind of experience. You need to (should be) in reasonably good shape, you have to carry a lot more gear (ties into the first point), there's a lot more planning and logistics to work out, and it's a much more rustic experience (literally camping every night, with a few hotel stays).

For the Camino, I started out 40 pounds overweight, I did zero physical training in preparation, I had to plan basically nothing except my flight, arrival day and departure day. I was able to do it with literally only a few weeks notice (I had never heard of it until a month prior.)

Ultimately what I'm saying is the Camino trails are much more accessible to a wide range of people, as long as they're able to fly to Europe.

ETA: I should perhaps explain that the Camino trails, or at least the most popular trail I took (the Francis) is really more of a walking trail than a hiking trail. It's mostly flat(ish) and is much closer to what's depicted in pictures posted on The Great American Rail-Trail.

[IncreasePosts]

Appalachian trail is pretty much wilderness unless you pop down to a town. Whereas the trail for the Camino de Santiago, at least the part that I was on, constantly sent you directly through towns.

[ghaff]

The US basically has more options for long distance backpacks where you're mostly camping. Parts of Europe offer more options for town to town (or hut to hut) walks that are often not that strenuous and may even have luggage shuttle options. One isn't better than the other but they are different in general.

[maxerickson]

There's probably lots of stretches where you need to go more than 10 miles to hit much of anything. There certainly is on long hiking trails in the Midwest and West.

Doing a quick search, there's spots where paved roads are 30 miles apart, and lots of times it will be more than 10 miles to get to the nearest town.

[ben7799]

The US and Canada have tons and tons of 500+ mile trails, heck tons of 1000+ mile trails.

Like 20+

[ethbr1]

What the state of places to stay on the AT these days?

Last I heard, there were still a lot of trail angel homes and on-trail campsites, but my info is ~25 years old.

[huytersd]

Yeah I don’t think there is any comparison in how much more superior the US is when it comes to long 500-1000 mile relatively accessible trails. I can think of 10 just off the top of my head.

[burntwater]

The Camino is vastly superior, just in a very different way.

ETA: I shouldn't say it's vastly superior, rather the Camino is a very, very different experience from the trails alluded to here, and is superior in relation to that experience.

[joking]

Él camino de Santiago is actually an ancient pilmigrage route, It has some variants but the main one has a lot of traffic and it's not rare to make friends as it's a very social route.

[omnibrain]

And there a still a lot of people walking it for religious reasons (to a varying degree). It is actually a whole network of ways that spans most of central and western Europe. So you can meet pilgrim quite frequently at some "choke points".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camino_de_Santiago#/media/File...

[burntwater]

I loved thinking about people 500 years ago walking on the same stones I was walking on, and thinking about what the exact spot I was currently standing on was like back then. What did it smell like? What did you see? Were the fields this open or were their more trees? Did you run into a lot of people?

Lots you can think about on the trail.

[huytersd]

I’ve done a tiny piece of the Camino. It might as well be a paved greenway.

[burntwater]

Then you did a tiny piece of it and have chosen to extrapolate from that tiny piece.

If it's not for you, that's totally OK. It IS something for many other people.

[huytersd]

Oh it’s definitely for me, I loved it but it’s not the standard to hold up to everything else.