When to go, crowds vs. weather

[Richard Ferguson]

The overall tradeoff is that the better the weather, the more crowded it will be.

July and August have the most pilgrims, 15,000 a month or more.  They are also
the only dry months.  The off season for pilgrims is, as you would expect,
November to March, with fewer than 1000 pilgrims per month.  April starts the
major flows of pilgrims, and it increases every month from April to August.
September is about half of the August number, so still busy, too busy for my
taste.

I stared at weather and pilgrim data til I was blue in the face.  I ended up
going in late March.  I choose worse weather to avoid crowds.  The weather that I
actually got was better than the average, I only had rain one day in five, so I
was lucky.

It comes down to your choice, just realize that you can't have both good weather
and no crowds, unless you are very lucky with the weather.

Richard