u/WashedUpVetStudent

Hi everyone! My girlfriend and I are planning to walk the Camino Francés next year, starting in Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port around mid-June and hoping to arrive in Santiago around July 23–24. We know June/July will be warm and busy, especially with 2027 being a Holy Year, so we’ve decided to book at least some of our accommodations ahead of time.
I’m about halfway through booking our route, but I’m starting to run into towns like Hornillos del Camino and Bercianos del Real Camino where Booking.com and other sites are showing little to no availability for our dates.
For those who have walked the Francés or booked this far in advance: is it likely that these places are actually already booked, or do many albergues simply not open their reservations until later?
I’m also wondering how much we really need to worry about pre-booking the smaller towns. Are there usually municipal/parochial albergues that keep beds for walk-ins, even when everything online looks sold out?
We’d prefer to have accommodations planned since we’re walking as a couple and have a fairly fixed schedule, but I also don’t want to panic and start changing stages if a lot of the availability simply hasn’t been released yet.
Any advice from people who have dealt with this would be greatly appreciated. Buen Camino!