Chapter 3: Aix-en-Provence, Part I

So, it turns out the journey of a thousand miles begins at the boot store. Finding hiking boots that don't injure my feet grows from a nagging worry to a full-on spiritual crisis.

Everything written about the Camino talks about your feet.

Well, ok, your mind and your feet. You walk for six to eight hours a day straight for weeks on end, fifteen to thirty miles a day, and your feet take a beating no matter how good your shoes are. Shoes that don’t fit end the hike early and abruptly. If you’re coming all the way from Aix-en-Provence, your boots need to get you over a thousand miles, up and over the Pyrenees, not to mention across the width of France and Spain, two pretty wide countries even generally stacked on top of each other.

The books all say you don’t need heavy boots like you need in mountaineering. You’re not going to be scrambling up the face of rocky ledges, not unless you get terribly lost anyway. You don’t want the weight of the shoes to become a drag on your knees and back, and you don’t want your feet to sweat a lot, because they’ll blister and that’s not good either. Sweat and moisture on your feet are such a big deal that you’re supposed to take y…