The Pilgrimage

The small, cramped, rapidly-overheating continent of Europe offers a number of historic pilgrimage trails for those who are interested. All you need is a bit of time and a decent pair of hiking boots, and you can walk in the footsteps of a long-dead saint.

But in the Year Of Our Lord 2026, with various modes of mechanized travel available to mankind, what kind of a person would forego all the various modes of convenient transportation available to them and choose to travel by foot, for miles and miles, day after day, enduring muscle camps, sunburns, injuries, and insects, while carrying a heavy backpack, during a historic summer heatwave?

Me and my dad, that’s who.

This picture was taken just as we were setting off on our 5-day pilgrimage. Our motivation wasn’t really religious. We weren’t seeking spiritual salvation. For us, it was just a nice excuse to

1. get some good father-son time, while also

2. seeing cool historic sites, as well as

3. being out in nature, and

4. getting our steps in.

After a bit of internet research, we decided for the St. Rupert Pilgrimage Trail. Working closely with a trusted tour guide some random website I stumbled upon, we put together our travel itinerary and booked lodgings along the route.

Our pilgrimage was set to start a few days after my parents came to visit us in Germany. My mom and wife graciously volunteered to watch the kids during our absence. My wife even said she’d drop us off at the starting point. Which was in Austria, a town about 2 hours from our home called Oberndorf Bei Salzburg. In the center of this village is a church known as the Stille-Nacht Kapelle (or Silent Night Chapel). The spot is world famous as the birthplace of the Christmas Carol. What it’s not world famous for, apparently, is the starting point for the St. Rupert Pilgrimage.

It turns out St. Rupert wasn’t nearly as famous as the internet had led us to believe. This spot was supposed to be where he embarked on his Big Important Walk. I just sort of assumed it would be swarming with fellow pilgrims eager to follow in his holy footsteps. I was expecting signposts, museums, statues. Maybe some St. Rupert merch too. T-shirts, keychains, replica robes. That kind of thing.

But no. There was none of that. If you’re a fan of Silent Night, this was the place to be. There was the church. There was a museum. There were info boards with text in multiple languages. Everywhere I looked, I saw Silent Night. But if you happen to be a St. Rupert groupie...zilch.

We searched the square for signposts pointing us in the right direction. Nothing. We asked a local. He’d never heard of it. We checked our phones, but our online maps couldn’t seem to agree.

Eventually, we entered a big nice information building that was located next to the chapel. When I mentioned the St Rupert Pilgrimage, the lady inside just stared at me blankly. Then she suggested we visit the Silent Night Museum.

Our pilgrimage hadn’t even started and already we were hopelessly lost.

All of which begs the question…

The internet told me Rupert traveled around Germany and Austria in the 7th and 8th centuries AD, converting pagans and baptizing people. This upset the local authorities, who didn’t like this guy spreading his weird new religion. As a result, Rupert was constantly getting himself banished from whatever region he happened to be in.

Many other saints became martyrs for their cause. They were beheaded, burned, and boiled. But other than a few pissed-off regional magistrates and some abrupt relocations, Rupert got off easy. He wasn’t tortured or killed. In the end, he died a peaceful death of natural causes.

Which is really freaking boring! Maybe if he’d put in a bit more effort, gotten himself killed in some cool gruesome way, maybe then he’d be more famous and we wouldn’t be stuck in this situation, bumbling all over the middle of this random town, surrounded by stupid Silent Night crap, unable to find anyone who’d ever even heard of St. Rupert.

But I wasn’t giving up! There had to be a clue somewhere! A medieval icon inside the church. A cryptic marker hidden in one of the cobblestones. Some mysterious relic of Rupert’s origins. I just needed to find it!

I felt like Robert Langdon in those dumb awesome Dan Brown books, racing against the clock, searching my ancient European surroundings for a secret symbol. And eventually, I found it. Concealed within a tourist brochure, there was a map! And on this map, I spotted a colorfully-marked route. And above the route, there were some big words that read, “ST. RUPERT’S PILGRIMAGE TRAIL.”

By decoding all these mysterious clues, I was able to use my keen intelligence and deep knowledge of symbology to point us in the right direction. At last, a mere hour and a half after arriving, we were ready to begin!

Our trek led us through the foothills of the Austrian Alps, a bit north of Salzburg. All around us, mountains towered above the horizon. We passed lovely farmhouses and fields of grazing cows, beautiful old churches and quaint villages, sparkling lakes and lush forests.

Each stage of the walk was somewhere between 16 and 20 kilometers. When you factor in the hilly terrain, the heavy backpacks, and the fact that my dad and I had a habit of getting horribly lost along the way, these were some long, tiring days.

And there was the whole issue with food. You see, a few years back, I converted to Vegetarianism, and much like St Rupert, I often suffer for my faith. Not all of the local establishments accepted my strange beliefs. Many of them offered nothing on their menus except schnitzel and sausage.

The worst of my travails came one evening. After a long, exhausting day of walking, we arrived, sore and hungry, in a small town where, for some inexplicable reason, the only restaurants were food trucks. We hobbled from one truck to another, asking if they had any vegetarian options. None of them did. And so we wandered on until at last, a miracle appeared in the distance.

Inside the ALDI I discovered some pre-made cups of lentils and bulgur, plus yogurt containers, which we purchased and carried with us back to one of the food trucks we’d visited earlier. There my dad bought a hot dog and fries, plus some beers for both of us. Even though I’d brought in outside food, the nice lady let me sit at the table there. She even gave me silverware and a plate for my ALDI scraps.

This must’ve been how Rupert felt, after trekking long distances and being cruelly rejected for his faith, finally encountering the kindness of strangers. The only difference was, at the end of the meal, I didn’t offer to baptize the waitress. Although I did leave her a nice tip.

Despite our many hardships and perils, my dad and I completed our long and difficult quest. We survived poor signage and sore muscles, hot temperatures and confusing Airbnb instructions, and in the end, I can honestly state, without any hyperbole, that I know exactly what St. Rupert must’ve felt like, all those centuries ago, after his spiritual journey was finished.

Should we also receive sainthood for our experiences? That’s not for me to say.

(But yes. Yes, we should.)

I began this chronicle by asking why anyone in this day and age would choose to go on a pilgrimage. At the start of our trek, I didn’t have a great answer. I was just looking for a nice walk with my dad. But now, I’ve come to understand it all a little better.

We live in an age of convenience. A time in which all the knowledge of the universe is contained within a screen. An era of digital distraction and AI slop. If you want to go somewhere, you can hop into a car. If you want to know something, you can ask the internet.

A pilgrimage is the opposite of all that. It’s intentionally slow. It’s out of the way and inconvenient. It’s a way to experience history, rather than skimming a Wikipedia entry. It’s all the things our modern world isn’t.

Don’t we all want something like that, every once in a while?

I’m writing this on the day after getting back. My legs are still a little sore. My shoulders are kinda achy. I’m happy to see my wife and kids again. To sleep in my own bed. To not be lugging around a humongous backpack.

It’s good to be home.

Thanks as always for reading and subscribing! I’ll see you again soon!

Saintly Regards,

Lee