Golan Rice could not have imagined how a chance encounter with a little bird on a windowsill would transform him from a senior state security official to a simple pilgrim on the Camino da Santiago and the co-founder of a new pilgrimage route to Jerusalem.

The 111-kilometer (69-mile) route, still in the making but already open for guided journeys, stretches from Jaffa Port in central Israel to the Jaffa Gate of Jerusalem’s Old City walls.

It is divided into six recommended sections, each ranging from 10 to 26 kilometers (six to 16 miles), and combines bustling urban streets with the nature and silence of the hills that lead up to the Holy City.

From Jaffa Port, the route passes through Rishon Lezion and Ramle in central Israel, Latrun, Abu Ghosh, and Ein Kerem, on the outskirts of Jerusalem.

What sets it apart from other treks, such as the Jesus Trail in northern Israel, is the way it exposes pilgrims — people from any faith (or none) and nationality — to communities and individuals who have signed up to become partners along the way, facilitating the exchange of stories, and, it is hoped, an internal journey and the opening of hearts to different beliefs and narratives.

Now 56, Rice, who is Jewish, spent over 30 years in security, 15 of them at El Al. While leading a weekly team meeting one wet and gray March morning, he looked out the window and caught sight of a small bird standing outside.

The two looked at one another, Rice recalled on a podcast (in Hebrew) last year, describing how the experience so moved him that he resigned the same day to plan a personal journey.

“I think the bird was there all the time. It was just that this time I saw her and listened to her,” he said during an interview on the podcast “L’tayel B’Klilut” (“Treading Lightly”).

That journey, both physical and internal, took him twice to different parts of the Camino de Santiago, a network of ancient pilgrimage routes across Europe that converge at the tomb of St. James at the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, in Spain.

Rice was fascinated by the story of St. James, a Jewish fisherman, born Jacob, son of Zebedee, in the Galilee area of northern Israel, who became an apostle of Jesus. According to one legend, his bones washed up on Spanish shores covered in shells and were buried in Santiago de Compostela. The shell has become the symbol of the Santiago de Compostela pilgrimage route.

He had heard of the Camino during a work stint in Spain and decided to walk it like a pilgrim, with a backpack and a walking stick.

“I had spent my life in jobs that demanded discipline, frameworks, and planning,” Rice told The Times of Israel. “For the Camino, I didn’t plan how far I would walk........

© The Times of Israel