Palmour Photographics: The Walk - From Delphi to Santiago

For 200 days in 1984 I walked from Delphi in Greece to Santiago de Compostela in Spain across the mountains of Europe. The following photographs are from that walk. They have been exhibited at the Royal Geographical Society and the Actors Institute in London, as well as at a number of galleries across the UK.

1 Lomnice - Macedonia

An ethnic Albanian village in predominantly Slavic Macedonia reachable only by footpath. The people gathered together and formed this tableau with no prompting. I hope the wars did not harm them.

2 Shepherds - Kosovo
Serbian peasants in predominantly ethnic Albanian Kosovo. We had just crossed the snow covered, wolf populated mountains from Macedonia, these were the first people we met on the Kosovo side.

3 Footballers - Kosovo
There were no cameras available to the people of these villages. People would pose with much dignity. I sent a copy of the photo to them when I returned to London.

4 Trees - Kosovo
Taken from an active railway line across the Kosovo plain. This was the best way to walk from A to B, and used by villagers as a daily route: best to keep an ear out for the express though.

5 Woman & Grandfather - Montenegro
Her husband was living high on the planina tending the sheep on the summer pasture for a week at a time. Today he was due back down in this village where the woman waited with her newly short-cut hair. She hoped he would like it, and made sure her grandfather was there to support her.

6 Planina Huts - Montenegro
On the planina pastures huts were maintained for shepherds to stay in whilst they tended their flocks. For the long winter this land is snow covered and inaccessible.

7 Vesna - Montenegro
A couple of teenage girls were chatting to us in a mountain village in Montenegro. The gaze of Vesna seemed to cut through time itself.

8 The Road to Rore - Bosnia
A road across the polje limestone plains of Bosnia. Traffic free.

9 Forestry Workers - Montenegro
After crossing the mountains from Kosovo, these were the first people we met in Montenegro, working high up in the mountain forest. We shared food, then they showed us the path down to the valley.

10 Ibrahim & Family
We stayed with this family on the Kosovo in their very basic and welcoming compound.

11 Lake Ohrid - Macedonia
The lakes of Ohrid and Prespa on the border of Albania, Greece and Macedonia are magical places.

12 Father & Son - Slovenia
The further north I travelled through Yugoslavia the more western and affluent it became.

13 Crowd of Schoolkids - Kosovo
Foreigners walking through communist Yugolsavia were not common. We stopped for some bread and cheese for lunch and this crowd formed around us, wanting to see, wanting to ask. Exhilarating.

14 Maronista - Macedonia
We would find ourselves walking with local folk living their lives. If someone wanted to stop, talk, drink, eat we would always do so.

15 Three Girls - Macedonia
It is best to meet excitement with openess. There was no place for suspicion on a walk like this.

17 Costas & Son
Walking deep in the Pindus mountains of Greece in early April it was still effectively winter. Meeting two strange strangers on the path [no roads here], Costas and his son invited us back to the family house as guests to stay the night.

16 Gypsy Children - Amfissa, Pindos Mountains

Despite the cold, the rain and the poverty these children brought us nothing but joy.

18 Man on Donkey
This proud man was keen to be photographed on his donkey on the way to the next village.

19 The Only Way Across
To get north from the village of Agrafa we had to take this path, crossing the river on a [very] temporary bridge.

20 Costas' Grandchildren
Lovely kids, watching our every movement, even if they had to stand it the rain to do so.

21 House - Karpenissi
Coming into the town of Karpenissi after 10 long days of lonely winter valleys I spotted this house of symmetry.

22 Man With Goat
How to carry a live goat to where you want it to go.

23 Shepherds in the Pindos
High in the isolated mountains, with villages deserted until June, shepherds such as these two men were often our only companions in Greece for days at a time.