We were the only people in the hotel dining room at 8:00pm on the eve of our Camino, having decided on an “early” dinner since we wanted to get a good night’s rest in anticipation of a very long hike. An older woman entered the dining room, sat down and ordered. She was at least a decade older than us, and when she finished her meal and got up to leave, we assumed she was a local, or a tourist who most definitely wasn’t going to be walking the Camino. Her gait was unsteady, stiff and tentative, like a colt just learning to walk, or like someone who’d spent a long time in a wheelchair. And yet, the next morning, there she was, walking the Camino just like us. Except that she was alone. She walked slow and steady, less shaky and more confident than she’d seemed the night before. We’ve seen her a few times, always walking alone, moving slowly and in a very focused and contemplative state. We’ve “Buen Camino-ed” her a several times over the past few days (the traditional greeting/encouragement on the trail), and she always smiles at us in return. And even though we never thought, the first time we saw her, that she’d be walking the Camino, let alone completing it, we now believe we’ll see her at the end, in Santiago. She’ll persist.

One of the very first things we noticed was how many women walk the Camino. Old and young, alone or in groups, we calculated that 70-75% of the people walking the Camino are women.

To better understand why, we’ve spent a few days chatting up the women we’ve met so far. There was the group from Catalonia: Mary Teresa, Ana, Ester and Carul, friends since college (which may have been multiple decades ago). We first laid eyes on them during dinner in the charming old inn that was our home the second night of our walk. Sitting in front of the fireplace, the four of them talked and laughed throughout the entire meal, paying rapt attention when one of them spoke, gazing at each other like old lovers. Their joy at being together was obvious, and the pleasure they clearly felt simply by being in each other’s company filled us with joy, too. The next morning, when we compared hiking notes with them, they teasingly scoffed at how short our trek had been the day before, since they’d walked a good six miles more than we had. They may have been older than us, but they were strong. They’d persist.

Next came Jane and her two adult daughters, Lynnette and Aline. Jane explained that, like us, she’d wanted to walk the Camino ever since she watched The Way. But her husband, who had always claimed he was “allergic to exercise,” wasn’t interested. When he died of Covid last August, Jane decided it was time, and her daughters agreed to join her. Despite a delayed flight and lost luggage, they’d finally arrived at the Camino and planned on making the most of it. They still didn’t have their luggage, but they had their hiking shoes, credit cards and each other. They’d persist.

Then there was Ann from LA. Her daughter had walked all 500 plus miles of the Camino back in 2019, and when Ann retired recently, her daughter gave her this trip as a retirement gift. “I left my husband at home. He’s working,” she said. “And, I figured that if my daughter could do it, I could at least walk this last part of it.” She was moving steadily and deliberately, her walking sticks rhythmically clacking against the road as we walked. Ann would persist.

Why is it that the Camino apparently calls out to women more so than to men? Is it that women feel more comfortable taking this contemplative walk because we’re more willing, experienced and perhaps conditioned to be more open, to share and express not only what we’re feeling but why we’re feeling it? Is that one reason (maybe even the major reason) why we live longer than men?

Before I went to bed last night, I read some of my text messages and I was crushed to see that U.S. laws may soon change, allowing state governments to treat women as if they are children, as if we’re incapable of making our own decisions about our own bodies and our own lives. Then I recalled the strong, courageous, contemplative, and joyous women I’ve met and seen on the Camino, women who, although tired, forge ahead, day after day. I have no doubt that each of them will reach Santiago de Compostela, no matter how difficult it is or how long it takes.

Because that’s what women do. We persist. We may stumble and fall, but then we get up and keep going. And the lucky among us will have friends, sisters, cousins, aunts, nieces, daughters, mothers, grandmothers and even strangers, all walking a similar path, who will lift us up, brush us off, offer us water, and help us to continue on.

It may look bleak for so many women and girls in the U.S. right now, especially those of few means, or those who are stuck in dangerous domestic situations. But we are women, and as such, we are strong, courageous, contemplative and joyous. They cannot hold us back, no matter how long or how hard they try. We persist. Always.

Especially when we walk together.