The yellow arrow is one of the most iconic images of the Camino de Santiago. The arrow points pilgrims in the direction of Santiago de Compostela and can be found on walls, rocks, trees or the very ground one walks upon. One simple piece of advice: Never turn unless there is a yellow arrow clearly instructing you to do so.
Don Elías Valiña, parish priest of the village of O Cebreiro, was the man behind the revival of the Camino de Santiago as we know it today and the first person to mark the way with this symbol. In the early 1980s, when Don Elías Valiña began his mission to mark the route, there were sections that were utterly impassable. His first task was to meet with mayors and local associations in order to identify and safeguard the original sections of the pilgrimage.
By the late 1980s, the entire Camino Francés was marked with yellow arrows. The reason behind the color of these arrows is quite coincidental: While Don Elías was considering the task of signing the entire 800 kilometres of the Camino, a local road maintainance company offered the leftovers of the yellow paint it was using for a signage project.
