Rafael Lopez has just walked 530 miles, he's lost count of the blisters on his feet, he's been queuing for three hours in pouring rain to get into a church -- and he's ecstatic.
"What's a bit of pain and a bit of rain if at the end of it you get God's forgiveness?" said Lopez, a Spanish student and devout Roman Catholic.
He had walked from the Pyrenees to Santiago, the city in Spain's lush northwestern corner traditionally believed to be the burial place of the Apostle Saint James, whose shrine has drawn pilgrims from all over Europe for more than 1,000 years.
Lopez has chosen 2004 to do the pilgrimage because it is a Holy Year in Santiago, which means the faithful can earn a plenary indulgence, or the cancellation of the time they would have had to spend in purgatory for their sins. It's known as the "gran perdonanza," or great forgiveness.
To receive it, you have to pray in Santiago Cathedral and preferably attend mass there. You also have to go to confession and receive holy communion within 15 days before or after your visit to the cathedral. An indulgence can also be secured for a deceased loved one.
BULGING BACKPACKS, MUDDY BOOTS
Holy Years occur when Saint James's feast day, July 25, falls on a Sunday. The last one was 1999 and the next is 2010.
In 1999, a record 155,000 pilgrims reached Santiago, according to the archdiocese, which expects more than 170,000 this year.
The medieval center of Santiago teems with hundreds of pilgrims, instantly recognizable by their bulging backpacks, muddy hiking boots and wooden walking sticks adorned with the distinctive scallop shells that symbolize the pilgrimage.
Some particularly fervent groups wear brown capes and floppy hats like the ones worn by Saint James in many statues and paintings. They carry banners bearing the apostle's special sword-shaped red cross and sing religious songs as they walk.
Defying exhaustion and torrential rain, pilgrims queue for hours to enter the cathedral through the Holy Door -- open only during Holy Years -- and give the traditional hug to the statue of Saint James that stands on the high altar.
There is another wait of several hours in the rain-swept street to obtain the compostela, a document in Latin granted to those who have covered at least the last 60 miles to Santiago by foot or on horseback, or the last 125 miles by bicycle.
Most stick to the minimum requirement, which takes four or five days. Those who walk from the Pyrenees usually spend between 25 and 30 days on the track, while some pilgrims take months to walk from distant parts of France or Germany.
The route has become increasingly popular over the past 20 years as growing numbers of people set out for reasons other than religion, attracted by the beauty of the landscapes, the medieval sights, or the physical challenge.
YUPPIES MEET MYSTICS
Some purists bemoan the tourist presence on the pilgrimage trail, and the local press have even coined a new word for them: "pijigrino," a play on the Spanish words "peregrino," pilgrim, and "pijo," yuppie.
Don Jenaro Cebrian Franco, an elderly priest who heads the office which gives out the compostela, had another bugbear: esoteric pilgrims attracted to the route by the works of best-selling Brazilian author Paulo Coelho.
Coelho has described his pilgrimage to Santiago as a turning point in his life and written about it in "The Pilgrimage."
"This has led to a lot of New Age propaganda and now we get people showing up asking where the column with the special energy is," complained Don Jenaro.
So with unprecedented numbers converging on Santiago, overcrowding on the paths has become a problem for many.
"It was war to get a bed at the end of each day," said Stephanie Le Guennec, a French teen-age girl scout who had just reached Santiago with a group of 19 friends, all in red shirts emblazoned with the ubiquitous shell.
Some pilgrims rise before dawn to find the next bed. Others send a car ahead with their luggage, much to the indignation of walkers who find all the best places taken when they arrive.
Many sleep on the floor in municipal sports centers.
COMMERCIALISM
Others objected to rampant commercialism in Santiago, whose streets are lined with shops offering everything from Saint James key rings, can openers and lighters to monks' habits that tourists can hire and have their photograph taken wearing.
Yet despite all this, almost all pilgrims, religious and curious, sporty and mystic, said they had loved the experience.
"We started out for cultural reasons but as the days went by we came to realize there was a special magic that you wouldn't get on an ordinary hike," said Juan Ortiz, from Barcelona, sheltering in a huge rain cape as he waited to hug the apostle.