CSJNE is our local group in the North East of England. We cover a large geographical area bounded by Scottish border, the Cumbrian border, and the border with Yorkshire in the south. Our local areas are Northumbria, Tyne and Wear, County Durham, and Tees Valley. 

We currently have 27 members, always happy to welcome more, and we are widely spread across our region. 

We have a partnership with the Friends of Finchale Camino Inglés, some of whom are also CSJ members, which is based in the Durham area. This group was established to identify and explore origins of the original Camino Ingles on its route south to Santiago de Compostela. A starting point for the Camino Ingles at Finchale Priory, Durham has been officially recognised by the Xunta de Galicia and the Camino is waymarked as an accepted route. If you would like to know more please get in touch. 

If you live in the northeast of England and would like to join us, please email Clare Taylor. 

Upcoming Events

21st March Cuthbert Saturday: We are once again invited to join with our friends in the Finchale Camino group to join the annual St Cuthbert’s Day Pilgrimage. We start from Finchale Priory and walk to Durham Cathedral. It is a great opportunity to come together and walk along the Camino Ingles from its official starting point in the Priory grounds to Durham Cathedral. If you are planning to walk the full Camino Ingles this year it is a great way to start locally with your first stamps on your pilgrim passport and be like those mediaeval pilgrims who started from their own front door. Full information from Keith Taylor

Save the date St James Day, 25th July, which falls on a Saturday this year. Plans are being made for the Annual St James Day Pilgrimage with walk, celebration, and tapas meal in Bishop Auckland.

Please watch here for more suggestions to come.

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A Member Remembers

One of our local group, another enthusiastic lifelong Camino Pilgrim, has been thinking back over so many enriching experiences of pilgrimage. When I read his words I was transported to my experience of the place he describes, I know so many others will be, too.

It was a long haul uphill and I was weary.  My memory (from a previous stop-off) was of prehistoric looking, straw roofed, oddly shaped dwellings with unbelievably low doors in this isolated village perched on a col, snowed up in winter and where kind people lived. I was encouraged by thoughts of a quiet and restful evening. But NO! O Cebreiro was thick with trippers, tourists, gift shops, postcard carousels, snack counters, vehicles, and the air was echoing with loud-speakers playing of Celtic music! Bemused, I bought a beer I didn’t want, hadn’t the stomach for as I sat in the nicotine slipstream of smokers. It was Saturday!

I just couldn’t get my act together so unwashed, unchanged, and unslept I headed to  peace and quiet in the small church. Mass was about to begin. I participated in a rite older than the pilgrimage itself - to give thanks for my life, for those who had given me help on the way, to pray for those on pilgrimage. On my right the Virgin Mary leaned forward while holding a sage and mature Christ child on her knee. Legend has it that at one Mass the communion bread and wine turned into real flesh and blood, that her statue leaned forward to see and never returned to the upright.

The service ended  with the blessing and the priest invited pilgrims in the congregation to join him around the altar to read the blessing in their own languages. Fifteen did so and I felt it a great privilege to pronounce that blessing in English. I walked out into the night, uplifted, renewed, looking at the stars and hoping to follow the Way of the Stars as had generations before. Breakfast next morning was in the Hospederia de San Geraldo do Aurillac which had been serving pilgrims  uninterrupted (but for 100 years] since the 11th century.

Photos: Felix Davies on the Chemin de Tours and in front of the cathedral in Santiago

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Past Events

March 2025

The new pilgrim year opened for CJSNE with our annual invitation to join the Cuthbert Saturday Pilgrimage from Chester le Street to Durham Cathedral via Finchale Priory, starting point of the Camino Ingles in the north of England. This pilgrimage is in celebration of St Cuthbert, Patron Saint of the north of England. This pilgrimage is jointly organised by Durham Cathedral and the Friends of Finchale Camino.

We were delighted to be joined by local members and friends and fellow CSJ pilgrims from CSJ Cumbria led by David and Chris. In all the group numbered approximately 130 people.

Friends of Finchale and CSJ members joined the pilgrimage at Finchale Priory, home to St Godric and start of the Camino Ingles in the north. After stamping of Pilgrim Passports and a blessing from the Dean of Durham Cathedral the group began the waymarked walk to Durham Cathedral. On arrival in the city we were met by Northumbrian pipes and we followed the banner of St Cuthbert and that of the Camino Ingles to the cathedral where passports were stamped and we were gifted with Pilgrim Tokens issued by the Cathedral.

The day concluded with sung Eucharist, led by Sarah Jarrow and the choirs of Durham and Newcastle Cathedrals.

Once again it was a magnificent day.

July 2024

We were invited to join the third annual St James’ Day celebration in Bishop Auckland on 21st July. A group met in the Market Place and made a symbolic pilgrimage through the grounds of the Bishop’s Park to the Bishop of Durham’s Chapel for a blessing and service to mark the feast of St James. This was followed by a celebratory meal in El Castillo Tapas Bar beside the Spanish Gallery.

The following day local CSJ members were invited to join filming for BBC Songs of Praise which is now available on iPlayer. Please note our long term member Peter who was interviewed for the filming and who brought along his original CSJ Pilgrim Passport from his first Camino years ago. 

March 2024

The St Cuthbert’s Day celebration was marked by a large gathering at Finchale Priory to celebrate the saint's day. The group met at the priory for a blessing and walked the section of the Camino Ingles from Finchale to Durham Market Place where we were greeted by a Northumbrian Piper who led the procession through the mediaeval streets to the Cathedral. Pilgrim passports were stamped at the Cathedral and we were all invited to join the sung service led by the Bishop of Ripon.