Hospitality on the Camino de Santiago: Clues from Interviews with Hospitaleros During the Pandemic

The practice of making the pilgrimage along the Camino de Santiago (the Way of Saint James), one of the three most important medieval pilgrimage routes in Europe, has undergone various transformations related to religious, cultural and political considerations. In 2019, the Pilgrim’s Reception Office in Santiago de Compostela recorded 327,378 pilgrims from all over the world. The aim of this research was to understand the impact of the pandemic on hospitaleros – the individuals who host pilgrims on the Camino de Santiago – and perform a comparative analysis against the hotel industry. In particular, it was noted that in a majority of studies and papers on the tourism and hotel industry, the primary criteria of evaluation were economic issues and the impact of the pandemic on the economy in terms of supply–demand and seller–buyer relationships. The study examined the characteristics of hospitality, which – in an etymological sense – is understood as cordiality and selfless kindness shown to strangers and is regarded in culture as one of the most valuable attitudes towards other human beings. In public discourse, the term most frequently appears in reference to travels, pilgrimages, tourism and other forms of intercultural contact, including diplomacy and migration policy.