El Camino Portugués

After getting a lot of advice from friends who’ve been there and done it, and also doing my own bit of research, here’s the rough list of equipment I’ll carry with me on my Camino Portugués:

Clothing

• a pair of hiking shoes
• a pair of sandals
• a pair of slippers
• two pairs of shorts
• one pair of trousers (for the colder evenings that I hope I won’t encounter)
• two pairs of hiking socks
• one or two pairs of regular socks
• a pair of gaiters
• raincoat (the fit-your-bag-under-it kind, of course)
• reflective straps (as I’ll be walking along roads quite a lot and don’t want to find myself travelling on the hood of a car all of a sudden)
• two hiking shirts
• a couple of regular T-shirts
• some sweater
• underwear (keeping the number to a minimum I won’t tell)
• swimming pants (as the beaches will be beckoning all the time)
• hat
• sunglasses

Sleeping equipment

• two sheets sewn together as a sleeping bag
• small pillow
• earplugs

Personal care

• towel (very light, it’s actually a nice big diaper)
• tissue and/or toilet paper (largely interchangeable)
• toiletries (no razor, I want to look like a real pilgrim when I arrive :) )
• medicine
• plaster
• sports cream

Technical

• headlamp
• telephone with charger
• small netbook
• camera
• tons of batteries for the items above

Miscellaneous

• a bar of washing soap
• a couple of clothspins to hang my fresh and flowery-smelling clothes
• pocket knife (against wild pilgrims – OK, just kidding :) )
• neck wallet
• some info about the route and the  albergues printed out
• notebook and pen
• and the single most important item: a waterproof folder for my credencial :)

What I’m not taking (still these might be useful to others)

• sleeping bag (I’m almost 2 metres tall, so they’re usually just a nuisance)
• mattress of any kind (being a bad sleeper, I’m not planning to sleep on the floor under any circumstances)
• walking stick
• hiking GPS to record where I’ve been (I wanted to, but I couldn’t get one)
• flask (I’ll fare with the 500 ml plastic bottles)
• needle and thread for blisters (I hate blisters, so I’m just gonna ignore them :) )

see also:

• Stuff I should and shouldn’t have taken
• What to carry on URCamino.com