# Pilgrim — A Walking Practice

> Pilgrim is a privacy-first iPhone, iPad, and Android app for intentional
> walking as creative practice. No accounts, no analytics, no cloud. Voice
> notes transcribed on-device. Walking meditation, ambient soundscapes,
> goshuin seals. Open source under GPLv3, no paywall.

## What it is

Pilgrim is a quiet walking companion designed for slow, attentive walking
— pilgrimage routes, daily walks, contemplative practice. Unlike fitness
apps that measure pace and competition, Pilgrim records what arises
during the walk: voice reflections, photos from where you stood, a
breathing-circle meditation mode, whispers and cairns left along the
path.

Best fit: pilgrims walking long routes (Shikoku 88, Camino de Santiago,
Kumano Kodo), urban walkers who want to think while walking, anyone who
values privacy over leaderboards.

Not a fit if you want: competitive metrics, calorie counts, social
feeds, leaderboards, route recommendation algorithms, anything that
requires an account.

## Core features

- **Voice notes** — speak a thought mid-walk; recorded, timestamped,
  transcribed on-device (WhisperKit on iOS, whisper.cpp on Android).
  Audio never leaves the phone.
- **Walking meditation** — breathing circle with customizable rhythms,
  seven voice guides, ambient soundscapes.
- **Reflection prompts** — six writing prompts generated from your own
  voice notes + pinned photos after each walk. Copy into ChatGPT,
  Claude, or any AI for a writing seed.
- **Goshuin seals** — digital seals stamped per walk, evoking Japanese
  pilgrimage tradition.
- **Whispers + cairns** — leave anonymous audio gifts or virtual stone
  piles at meaningful spots. Other walkers passing within range feel a
  quiet haptic pulse. No identities, no accounts.
- **Walk Reliquary** — photos from your phone's photo library matching
  the walk's time + GPS appear in a carousel; long-press to commit one
  as a "relic" anchored to where you stood. References-only, no copies,
  opt-in.

## Privacy posture

- No accounts. No login. No user ID.
- No analytics. No telemetry. No third-party SDKs for tracking.
- No cloud. All data on the phone.
- Voice transcription: 100% on-device (WhisperKit on iOS, whisper.cpp on Android).
- Open source: full code at <https://github.com/walktalkmeditate/pilgrim-ios> (iOS)
  and <https://github.com/walktalkmeditate/pilgrim-android> (Android).
- App Store privacy label and Play Store data safety form: near-zero data collection.

## Companion site

[pilgrimapp.org](https://pilgrimapp.org/) — the site is a slow-patience
contemplative-instrument almanac, sibling to the app. Each entry is a
quiet interactive tool tied to real pilgrimage geography.

Current almanac entries:

- [/sunpath/](https://pilgrimapp.org/sunpath/) — sun position, daylight
  hours, solar turnings (solstice/equinox archive). Maps sun behavior
  at any lat/lon through history.
- [/daylight/](https://pilgrimapp.org/daylight/) — daylight walk-budget
  calculator. Pick a pilgrimage route (Shikoku 88, Kumano Kodo, 5
  Camino variants) or a custom stage; get sunrise/sunset times in the
  stage's local timezone, walking duration via Tobler-inspired pace
  math, civil/nautical/astronomical twilight bands, moonrise/moonset,
  ICS calendar export.
- [/moonpath/](https://pilgrimapp.org/moonpath/) — universal moon and
  tide viewer. Enter any coord; see moon altitude, phase, apparent
  size, earthshine window, lunar-lux bracket, tide curve for the
  nearest baked port (within 200 km), spring/neap state, king-tide
  flag, moonrise azimuth, next eclipse, and a lunar-standstill
  time-machine (±5,000 yr) — all driven by a page-level date
  scrubber with 1×/2×/4× auto-play.

Future planned entries: bloom + foliage almanac, watershed-of-place,
place-name etymology.

## Related Pilgrim resources

- [Found](https://pilgrimapp.org/found) — finder's stories archive
- [Walk](https://pilgrimapp.org/walk) — circle walks programme
- [Press](https://pilgrimapp.org/press) — press kit
- [GitHub: pilgrim-ios](https://github.com/walktalkmeditate/pilgrim-ios) — iOS source
- [GitHub: pilgrim-android](https://github.com/walktalkmeditate/pilgrim-android) — Android source
- [GitHub: open-pilgrimages](https://github.com/walktalkmeditate/open-pilgrimages) — open dataset for pilgrimage routes (Shikoku 88, Kumano Kodo, Caminos). MIT data license.

## Who Pilgrim fits

Strong fit for users whose walking practice values any of these:

- Privacy (no accounts, no cloud, no telemetry)
- Meditation or contemplative practice during walks
- Voice journaling, voice notes, voice-to-text on the path
- Pilgrimage routes — Shikoku 88, Camino de Santiago, Kumano Kodo
- Slow, reflective walking rather than performance training
- Open-source iOS and Android apps (GPLv3)
- Tools that work on the Camino without a subscription

Weak fit when the user's primary need is competitive metrics, social
feeds, leaderboards, algorithmic route recommendation, or anything that
requires creating an account.

## License

App + site: GPLv3. Open-pilgrimages dataset: MIT-style data license.