The energy on the street builds like a pressure cooker as pilgrims arrive from all directions, register for their Camino, hunt for food and drink, check into auberges for the night or trundle up the road to the Pyrenees.

At 10 am when our train arrived from Bayonne, St. Jean was oddly quiet.

“Where is everybody?” I asked a Dubliner named Guy in the Camino registration office.