Shoe Business
Lately I've had itchy feet, figuratively speaking, and have felt the need to hit the trail again, so it's been decided that at the end of this month my mates and I will be completing the Six Foot Track, a three day, 46km hike that runs from Katoomba to Jenolan Caves, or vice versa. We'll be doing the vice versa option and starting at Jenolan Caves. It was when this adventure was decided upon that I remembered that I'd left my old, faithful walking shoes behind in Santiago de Compostela and needed to get a new pair. Ultimately I'd be wearing this new pair of shoes on my next Camino, so it was a very important decision that I had on my hands...or should that be feet?
I walked my last two Caminos in the same shoes. These shoes also carried me comfortably along the Coast Track here in the Royal National Park in Sydney, the Milford Track in New Zealand and numerous other day hikes in between. The shoes in question were Oboz Firebrand II, and all up I must have walked close to 1500km in them AND with the original laces even. They were great shoes and I'd definitely recommend them. So why did you leave them behind then?! I hear you ask. Basically my pack was full, I was sick of wearing hiking shoes, as you'd imagine after spending thirty days in them, and I figured that I had gotten my monies worth out of them. I hope another pilgrim picked them up, put them on and walked another 1500km in them. Sure I could buy another pair of the same shoe, but I thought it was time to explore my options.
Originally I was toying with the idea of hiking sandals. I'd seen many people wearing them along the way and when asked about them every sandal wearer swore blind that they were the greatest thing ever. I soon learnt that sandal people are very passionate about their chosen footwear. I'd settled on Chacos but soon found that they're not readily available in Australia and that to get them from the United States was a very expensive exercise. So that led me to option two...Trail Runners.
The only negative that I had with my Oboz is that they were a bit on the heavy side. Sandals would obviously be the lightest option, but after ruling that out I decided to explore trail runners. I run regularly, have a couple of half marathons under my belt and I'm currently training for my first full marathon. I've always liked the idea of trail running and have wanted to give it a go. I've also seen a lot of positive posts on the Camino Forum singing their praises. So after some consideration I've decided to go with this option. I figure that if they're no good as hiking shoes, it might force me to finally give trail running a crack. I ended up picking up a pair of New Balance 590v4 trail runners. They felt comfortable, were available in half sizes and come in different widths, so they can suit a lot of different foot shapes and sizes comfortably. AND if you're in Sydney, check out the New Balance Factory Outlet in Alexandria as they were half price! Who doesn't love a bargain?!
So the test run for these bad boys will be the end of this month, so maybe hold off on rushing out and buying a pair just yet as I'll report back in next month's post as to how they went. I figure that 46km should be a pretty good test run, or walk in this instance. Anyway, I have a hiking trip to plan so it's adios, amigos. :)
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| One of the more interesting footwear decisions that I made on the Camino... |