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You’ll carry a cherished item with you on your walk from Portugal north to Santiago de Compostela — a pilgrim passport. This passport is a trademark of all pilgrim routes leading to Camino de Santiago, and it serves as a record of your journey and a proof of your pilgrimage. 

Your Camino Portugués Pilgrim Passport grants you access to albergues and qualifies you to pick up an official certificate from the pilgrim’s office in Santiago de Compostela. Once it’s filled with stamps and memories, it’s also a wonderful memento and keepsake from your steps along the Camino Portugués.

Here’s everything you need to know about pilgrim passports on the Portuguese Way.

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Have a question? Leave a comment at the bottom and I’ll reply right away 🙂

What is a pilgrim passport and how does it work?

A pilgrim passport is a folded paper document that grants you access to pilgrim hostels, called albergues. This document is also what qualifies you to collect a Compostela certificate from the pilgrim office in Santiago de Compostela, so long as you’ve walked at least 100 kilometers / 62 miles on the Camino. It’s also sometimes called a pilgrim credential. 

For help planning your entire walk, read my Portuguese Camino Planning Guide.

Where do you get your pilgrim passport for the Portuguese Camino?

You purchase your official Camino passport for the Camino Portugués at the cathedral where your Camino begins. It costs €4.00 and can be purchased with cash or card at the Lisbon, Porto, and Tui cathedrals. Here are the hours and locations of each cathedral:

• Lisbon Cathedral: Google Maps, open daily 7 am – 7 pm
• Porto Cathedral: Google Maps, open daily 9 am – 5:30 pm
• Tui Cathedral: Google Maps, open daily but hours vary, check Google Maps

Planning tip: If you’re planning on leaving early in the morning, you’ll want to be sure to budget time to pick up your pilgrim’s passport the day before.

Is there a dedicated passport for Portuguese Camino?

Yes, the Portuguese Camino has a different cover than the other routes, such as the Camino del Norte or the Camino Inglés, but any Camino de Santiago passport is acceptable to use to gather stamps and collect your Camino certificate.

Do you need to buy your pilgrim passport ahead of time?

No, most pilgrims do not need to buy their passports before their trip. You can buy your passport when you land in Portugal as long as you arrive in Lisbon, Porto, or Tui with enough time to make it to the cathedral. Buying it in advance results in extra costs (like an upcharge from a company and postage, plus the risk of it not arriving in time).

Where do you get stamps on the Portuguese Camino de Santiago?

You can collect stamps for your pilgrim passport in many different locations along the Camino Portugués:

• Your starting cathedral
• Churches along the Camino (some but not all) 
• Roadside pilgrim stops 
• Cafes and bars
• Tourism offices 
• Restaurants
• Albergues

Walkers will have no trouble meeting their daily stamp requirements. If you’re doing the Camino with an alternative form of transportation, such as on horseback, you’ll have to be more attentive looking for stamp locations.

Stamps aren’t official or regulated. You don’t need to visit tourism or municipal offices to get “official” stamps. Any local institution can buy a stamp, and by doing so they invite pilgrims off the road into their establishment. I’ve even seen seasoned pilgrims with their own stamps that they offer to pilgrims!

How many stamps do you need on the Portuguese Camino?

While on the Portuguese Camino, you should get one or two stamps per day. The rule of thumb is to get one stamp when you’re further away from Santiago de Compostela, two per day within the last 100 km.

The busier the route is, the more important it is for albergues to verify that pilgrims are genuine and not just taking advantage of the low accomodation prices, so getting two stamps per day is wise.

Your passport has 56 blank spaces, which allows for approximately:

1. ∼10 stamps per day if you walk from Tui
2. ∼4 per day if you walk from Porto
3. ∼1-2 per day if you walk from Lisbon

You should make sure you leave extra space in your passport if you’re walking the Camino Finisterre, the extension to the ocean after Santiago de Compostela.

Getting Your Compostela Certificate

Once you’ve arrived in Santiago to Compostela with your pilgrim passport, you must go to the pilgrim’s office to claim your Compostela. 

This process can be quick when there are a few pilgrims or it can take much longer during peak times. Budget extra time for this step. The pilgrims’ office even warns that it can take until the next day to get your certificate during busy times. 

The Compostela is free, but you must do an intake form and brief interview that allows the office to gather data on pilgrims. You can also pay €10-€15 for a more decorative certificate. 

Learn more in my guide: Camino Compostela FAQs.

Note: Your certificate is NOT needed to attend the pilgrim’s mass at the Cathedral, so you can save this stop for the day after arrival if it suits your schedule better. 

Brief History

Pilgrims from the Middle Ages didn’t have passports to vouch for their pilgrimage — instead, they used scallop shells. Once a pilgrim arrived in Santiago to Compostela, they were given a scallop shell by the church to signify that they were a pilgrim. 

This granted them protection, as it was illegal to harm pilgrims on their journeys home back to their hometown. Can you imagine having to walk all the way back?! 

You can still buy a scallop shell in Santiago Compostela at any number of souvenir shops. 

Speaking of arriving in Santiago — I have 9 tips for your arrival.

Tips For Your Camino Pilgrim Passport

Buying and using your pilgrim passport is straightforward. Get these next tips under your belt and you’ll be a pro before you even hit the trail.

Portuguese + Spanish Translations

You don’t need to learn Portuguese and Spanish to walk the Camino Portugués, but basic vocabulary is important. Here are a few things to know before your walk.

• Pilgrim passport
  • Portuguese: Credencial del Peregrino
  • Spanish: Credencial del Peregrino
• Passport stamps
  • Portuguese: Carimbos
  • Spanish: Sellos
• “May I have a stamp please?” 🙂
  • Portuguese: Pode dar-me um selo, por favor? 🙂
  • Spanish: ¿Me da un sello, por favor? 🙂

These sentences were translated by DeepL. And yes, I always put a smiley face at the end of a sentence like this to remind myself to smile!

Waterproof It

The odds of walking the entire Camino de Santiago without any rain are slim. If it happens to you, send me an email because I think I want to take you with me to buy a lottery ticket!

When you’re walking for more than a week, the odds of staying completely dry are slim. Walkers taking the 100-kilometer route from Tui or Vigo might be lucky enough to avoid rain on their 5 days of walking.

Take a Ziploc bag for your pilgrim passport and keep it in there at all times. It also protected it from any leaking water bottles or spilled toiletries. 

Include Your Contact Info

Losing such a precious momento would be sad, plus it would disqualify from collecting your certificate in Santiago Compostela. Make sure that you write your name and contact info inside of your pilgrim passport so that you have a chance of it being returned to you.

A tip for Canadian or American pilgrims: If you’re writing your phone number, you’ll need to include the +1 country code and will want to download WhatsApp.

WhatsApp is the standard medium for communication in Europe, so you will likely be messaged there if your passport was found. It may also be prudent to include an email address. 

Post-Camino Ideas

Step aside postcards, keychains, and t-shirts — no souvenir can come close to commemorating this journey like the passport (well, except maybe your scallop shell). You can choose to scrapbook your passport, or make a nostalgia-filled piece on wall art when it’s framed like this shadow box idea:

There’s a lot of inspiration online from how other people have treasured their Camino pilgrim passports. Many of these ideas are from other Camino routes, like the popular Camino Frances which starts in Jean Pied de Port. Something beautiful about the Camino is that there’s always another spiritual journey awaiting you if you feel called back to The Way.

Buen Camino, Pilgrim! 

On my first Camino, I didn’t think much of my passport. I was walking for the experience, and didn’t even care if I got my Compostela certificate at the end. But somewhere along the route, an attachment to those colorful stamps appeared.

It’s undeniable that a part of the magic of pilgrimage lives inside this simple passport. The crooked, misaligned collection of stamps represents the steps, people, and memories from this journey.

If you find yourself longingly looking at your passport after returning home, it may be a sign that the Camino de Santiago’s grip on you isn’t over and you might find another pilgrimage in your footsteps. I wish you a Buen Camino, wherever this journey takes you!