The Right Shoes for the Camino: Size, Breaking In, Boots or Trail Runners

If you're going to spend several weeks on the road with a backpack, covering hundreds of kilometres on foot, you'll think carefully beforehand about what comes along and what stays at home. Besides choosing your route and putting together your packing list, one decision is especially important: your shoes.

Only with the right shoes do you stand a good chance of arriving as blister-free as possible and without injuries. Many a pilgrim has prepared too little here and paid a high price for it along the way. So take your time over this choice.

Check your old shoes or try on new ones

If you already own hiking shoes, check them honestly to see whether they're fit for a pilgrimage lasting several weeks. If not – or if they're old and worn out – your best bet is to visit an outdoor specialist shop near you. There you can try on different models and feel which shoe fits your foot and which doesn't. Because there aren't just many kinds of shoes – every foot is different too.

Photo by Maren Meyer

The right size

One of the most important factors is size. If possible, buy your pilgrim shoes at least half a size larger than your everyday shoes. Over the many kilometres your foot gradually swells and needs more room. If the shoe is too tight, it pinches and rubs – and you get blisters and other painful pressure points.

Be sure to wear your hiking socks when you try shoes on. They're much thicker than normal socks and take up extra room in the shoe. Only with them on can you realistically judge whether a shoe really fits.

Photo by Granzyna Kostrubiec

Breaking in your shoes

Just as important: break your shoes in before you walk several hundred kilometres in them. Do a few test hikes at home in full pilgrim gear – with the new shoes and a packed backpack.

That way shoe and foot get used to each other, and you get a feel for how the full backpack sits on your back. If the test hike is already a struggle, you're probably carrying too much.

Photo by Katie Waity

Hiking boots or lightweight shoes?

You can't go wrong on the Camino with classic hiking boots. If you have a pair you also use for day hikes, you can happily take them on the Camino.

If you need new shoes anyway, it's worth looking beyond the obvious. More and more pilgrims are walking not in boots but in trail running shoes, running shoes, multi-purpose shoes or even hiking sandals.

Advantages of lightweight shoes

These types of shoe are much lighter than high hiking boots – and according to research, the weight on your feet affects your performance. In other words: if you walk in trail running shoes, you can cover longer distances with the same energy than someone in high-cut boots.

Photo by Silke Kaikowsky

In the mountains and on scree-covered terrain, hiking boots are a must, but on the Camino they're not essential. Many Camino routes repeatedly lead over asphalt, meadows, pastures and forest tracks with fairly even ground and little elevation gain. Exceptions include the mountainous Camino Primitivo and parts of the coastal Camino del Norte.

Disadvantages of lightweight shoes

On the other hand, lightweight shoes are often not waterproof. And if you twist your ankle – say, because your concentration slips at the end of a long day – they protect your foot less than a high boot.

Photo by Josée Jungers

There's no one perfect shoe

There's no such thing as the shoe for the Camino. There are many shoes and types of shoe – and only you can find out which ones you feel comfortable in.

Try to find that out before your trip. That way you'll spare yourself pain and injuries to your feet and won't have to buy new shoes along the Camino. A visit to a specialist shop near you is highly recommended for this.

Photo by Nicole Köhler

Shoe stories

No two pilgrims experience the same Camino, and the same goes for feet. Nobody walks in someone else's shoes. Here pilgrims tell the stories of their shoes:

Teresa Sophie: My story is that I walked the Portuguese Way in Fivefingers. One pair had holes three-quarters of the way along, and I walked the rest in the ones in the photo. 😁

Jennifer Hansen: My trusty Meindl boots accompanied me on my Camino in 2013 and still do. At one point, roughly around Astorga, I swapped them for sandals from a trekking shop because it was very hot, and I probably paid for that brief switch with a stress fracture in my metatarsal. From then on I wore the boots again for the rest of the way, laced very tightly, and that worked. I think sturdy, supportive footwear is immensely important for undertakings like this.

Ina Tito: We walked part of the German Way of St. James, the Via Baltica.
The picture was taken after we'd gone astray, soaking wet after crossing a field, shortly before our destination. Tellingly, the stretch of path just before was called “Holzweg” – German for “the wrong track”.

Hermann Wenzel: My shoes at León station.
I wanted to escape the dreary January weather. There were many destinations to choose from. The Caminho Português from Porto won. It was a wet year, a lot of rain had fallen in December, and the paths were pretty muddy and partly flooded. So my choice of shoes was exactly right. When I arrived in Santiago I didn't feel like going home. On to Fisterra or the Francés in reverse were the two options that came to mind. The Francés in reverse won. It was only 250 kilometres to Astorga. Once there, there was a bus to León. The next day at León station, the pilgrim shoes were allowed into the backpack for the train ride home.

Sandra Schüller: My Meindl shoes. At least 10 years old and super comfortable. The soles were already very worn, though. But, how shall I put it: they stank. Clever me poured washing powder into them in the morning, like a kind of foot powder. Of course it rained that day, and suddenly I was standing in a field in a cloud of foam. But it helped. For one day. I threw them away on the last day and travelled home in sandals.

Tanja Zeiser: My shoes in the photo – after the Portugués they urgently needed airing.

Hermann Wenzel: A break on the Via Francigena. I was walking the Via Francigena in France with my pilgrim friend Michelle from Florida. It was a hot June day. Our feet were steaming. There was no café, no bar. We took a rest at a playground. Our feet and shoes got to air out and dry.

Sandra Andrea: I was done! Not one more metre in my trekking shoes, I thought! … half an hour in flip-flops … and then I carried on in the other shoes after all ;)

Hilde Treichl: I was over the moon with my Meindl hiking shoes, which I'd actually bought a year before setting off. On my salesman's advice I'd already walked many km at home. Whenever I felt they were pinching somewhere, I could come into the shop, and they would soften that spot and stretch it overnight. I was also very lucky, though. Once I left my shoes in the shop overnight, and that night the shop was broken into. All the shelves were cleared out – only my dirty hiking shoes were left standing. Luckily. My friend and I started at the Somport Pass and walked to Santiago without a break. It was so beautiful, curiosity drove us on. We kept going to Finisterre, where the photo was taken, and then on to Muxía. I have to say, these shoes were/are a dream – I didn't get a single blister or pressure point.

Antje Reichert: Left my shoes behind and did the last 10 km barefoot. Result: lots and lots of blisters (because it was far too hot to go without shoes) and a days-long overdose of endorphins 😀😁🤣😃

Magdalena Brandstätter: … because sometimes going without is simply the most beautiful!

Gert Kleinsteuber: At the “end of the world” – my heroes!

And your shoes?

Do you have a story about your pilgrim shoes too? Email us at info@caminoninja.com – we'll be happy to add to this page.

More on this: Rain jacket or poncho?