I ended my engagement and went on a 500-mile pilgrimage in my Crocs

A woman ended her nine-month engagement and booked a spontaneous flight to walk a 500-mile pilgrimage.

Kayleigh Castle, 36, and her ex got engaged after five weeks together but she decided to end their relationship on Boxing Day 2024 after realising 'marriage wasn't for her'.

After watching a video on TikTok, she spontaneously booked a plane ticket to Porto, Portugal, to walk the Camino de Santiago - a network of pilgrimage routes leading to a cathedral in Spain.

On her way to the airport, Kayleigh found her bag was too heavy and threw out her walking boots - meaning she had to walk 200 miles of the 500-mile route in her Crocs. But said her five weeks in Portugal allowed her to "find herself" and left her feeling "energised" to start her life again.

Kayleigh, a life coach, from Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, said: "Marriage is all about making compromises and sacrifices and I wasn't willing to do that so I realised that maybe I was not a marriage girl.

“A relationship isn’t the be-all and end-all - the most important relationship you’ll ever have is the one with yourself and that’s why I set off, to feel like me.

"When you are walking, you have no distractions, I didn't see a soul. I processed my thoughts with nobody else's opinions."

Despite the peaceful nature of the pilgrimage, Kayleigh did find herself accidentally gatecrashing a wedding.

She said: "One night I went to do my laundry which was an hour's walk away from the hostel. I didn't want to walk an hour so I sat in a bar and had a glass of wine. I inadvertently gatecrashed a wedding, there is me in this camouflage dry robe and Crocs in the middle of this wholesome wedding."