Remembered on the Camino

If you are walking to Santiago de Compostela on the French Way, the Camino de Frances, you will reach this modern monument just 5km before the end of your journey at Monte do Gozo. It means mountain of joy, because from here (if it is not a 'soft day') you will catch your first glimpse of the towers of the Cathedral. There is an old Chapel of Reconciliation there.

There are commemorations of famous pilgrims - St Francis of Assisi and Pope St John Paul II. And there is a memorial also to St Patrick's Father Paudie Moloughney who died in 2015. A simple piece of black bog oak from Ireland and a plaque. Paudie was a great person, a great priest, a great missionary and life-long pilgrim. He had walked on one occasion from his home in Tipperary to Santiago. He had walked the Appalachian way. On his life's pilgrimage he made countless friends who treasure his memory. If you are passing do stop and say a prayer.

If you miss it, it's only an hour's walk back from Santiago, back the way you came in!