London to Walsingham Camino - The Pilgrimage Guide

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The whole 177.8 mile pilgrimage could be accomplished by a fit walker in a fortnight or less. But maybe you want to walk for fewer miles each day, or just at weekends, or on odd days when you have the time and energy. This guide caters for multiple approaches. St Mary’s, Bartlow (pilgrim stamp) Duncan Ogilvy will be at church with stamp. Loos and kitchen available This route via Bury St Edmunds is 144 miles includingall the twists and turns. Starting on Sunday (say 9am Mass at Westminster Cathedral) and walking an average 20 miles a day gets you to Fakenham on Saturday evening. This allows a leisurely 4 mile walk on Sunday to the Catholic Shrine at Houghton St Giles for the mid day pilgrim Mass (a further 1 mile to Little Walsingham gets you to the Anglican Centre where Mary is also venerated and a range ofsmall town amenities, accommodation etc.). For 400 years, no pilgrims walked to Walsingham. Since the 1930s, when both Catholic and Anglican shrines were re-established here, Walsingham has undergone a revival. It draws around 300,000 pilgrims each year, but hardly any of them walk much more than the final Holy Mile, and only a few church and other groups trace the full route from London. It would also be wonderful to include routes from the other key starting points for medieval Walsingham pilgrims: Ely, Kings Lynn and Norwich.

You will note that I have at least one church on the itinerary each day, where possible for either for an Anglican service, Catholic Mass or a simple blessing. Attendance at these is entirely optional. A pilgrim path that offers a wonderful long-distance route, on footpaths and quiet lanes, across the glorious east of England. The London to Walsingham Camino is a modern re-creation by Andy Bull of what was reputedly the most popular pilgrimage in England from London to the shrine at Walsingham in Norfolk until Henry VIII outlawed pilgrimage and the veneration of saints in 1538. From London's Church of St Magnus the Martyr next to London Bridge, with its shrine to Our Lady of Walsingham, it leads to the Anglican and Catholic shrines at Walsingham in Norfolk, following footpaths and quiet lanes across the countryside east of England while visiting many towns on the way. Walsingham was England's Nazareth, where in 1061 a Walsingham noblewoman, Lady Richeldis de Faverches, claimed a vision in which the Virgin Mary transported her soul to Nazareth and showed her the house where the Holy Family once lived, and in which the Annunciation of Archangel Gabriel, foretelling Jesus's birth, occurred. She was told to build a replica of the house in Walsingham, and it became a shrine attracting pilgrims to Walsingham from Europe including numerous kings. In the Christian world it was eclipsed by just three other places: Jerusalem, Rome, and Santiago de Compostela.

The whole 177.8 mile pilgrimage could be accomplished by a fit walker in a fortnight or less. But maybe you want to walk for fewer miles each day, or just at weekends, or on odd days when you have the time and energy. Walsingham was by far the most important pilgrim shrine in England until Henry VIII outlawed pilgrimage and the veneration of saints in 1538. It was much more popular than Canterbury. I hope to be able to offer some pilgrimage-related activities in Bury, and am discussing this with the Cathedral team. It all depends on how many we will be.

The London to Walsingham Caminoguidebook is part of an attempt to change that: to re-establish a walking route which, while being as true to the original way as possible, takes account of the modern realities on the ground. A pilgrim path that offers a wonderful long-distance route, on footpaths and quiet lanes, across the glorious east of England. A truly pleasurable and uplifting walking experience. The London to Walsingham Camino Pilgrimage Guide is exceptional in its presentation, highlighting the historical context of the ancient Pilgrim Routes, alongside the spiritual reasons as to why people have made pilgrimage to Walsingham over so many centuries. It eloquently speaks to us of the often unknown spiritual heritage of England. Perhaps lost jewel to be rediscovered! The book is fascinating on myriads of levels with insights from some of the great British authors which have the capacity to open us to the depths of our great literary heritage along side the spiritual one.

Highlighted holy place: Walsingham Abbey Shrine– There are two modern shrines in the village of Little Walsingham – the Anglican and Catholic shrines. However, in the footprint of the abbey ruins is where the true shrine remains. Here the young noblewoman Richeldis de Faverches had three visions of the Virgin Mary and consequently desired to replicate the Holy House of Nazareth, where Mary herself had had her most famous vision, the annunciation – at the spot in the photo. Construction was difficult but, in the end, it was built miraculously (not by humans). Walsingham eventually became one of the greatest pilgrimage shrines in medieval Europe before it was destroyed by dastardly Henry. The poem Pynson Ballad remains to tell of its greatness.

But when I told the many people we met along the way that this was a pilgrimage I got a fair few blank looks. Yet, if I said this was a Camino, ‘like they have in Spain’, I almost always got nods of recognition. Often they knew of the film, The Way, in which a character played by Martin Sheen walks to the shrine of St James in Santiago, in honour of a son who died on the eve of his own Camino journey. We became three when Sarah, an Anglican deacon, also signed up for the full slog. We were joined along the way by others, a couple for a week, others for a day or three, and became a generally merry band, even in the face of rain, storm, hail, blisters and creaking knees. The trail leads from London to pass through Waltham Abbey, Ware, Stansted, Mountfitchet, Saffron Walden, Withersfield, Stansfield, Bury St Edmunds, Thetford, Brandon, Great Cressingham, Castle Acre, Fakenham, and it ends in Walsingham. The first section routes east along the Thames heading north at Limehouse in the Lea Valley to reach Waltham Forest and includes much waterside walking. St Mary’s, Houghton on the Hill (pilgrim stamp) This church, with its 1,000-year-old wall paintings, will be specially opened for us.London to Walsingham Camino guidebook is a full colour guide to walking the re-established pilgrimage route from the Church of St Magnus the Martyr, with its shrine to Our Lady of Walsingham to the Anglican and Catholic shrines at Walsingham in Norfolk.