<HTML><FONT FACE=arial,helvetica><FONT SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Lucida Sans Unicode" LANG="0">Hi Mary,<BR>
I don't think that one can generalize about best Camino shoes and so on. Your weight, frame, manner of walking (turning feet inward, outward) etc., have a great deal to do with it. <BR>
In my first pilgrimage I wore some high-tech half-ankle boots, two pairs of socks, one thin and one thick, turned inside out, and took all sorts of recommended precautions; nevertheless the boots were cumbersome (I ended up calling them "the monsters") and I did develop some blisters. Luckily a Brasilian pilgrim advised me to wrap my feet in Vick's vaporub (of all things) and forget about the two pairs of socks. It helped... but I still hated the shoes and couldn't get rid of them fast enough the moment I got to Santiago.<BR>
Some time later, in Italy, I mentioned to a shoe salesman, who is also a podiatrist, my experience with the boots; he asked my weight and whether ordinarily the heels in my flat shoes wear out on the outside, or the inside, he looked at the curvature under my feet, saw me walk to see whether I stomp or walk softly, and ultimately said that wearing the trekking boots I wore, backpack or not, was counterproductive and that I was lucky that my feet were not permanently damaged or deformed. He pointed out that choosing shoes for long and strenuous walks without taking into consideration the wearer's individual physical characteristics and walking ways simply will not do. <BR>
His advise makes perfect sense to me.<BR>
Ever since, I've only worn half-ankle Valleverde walking shoes (Lirmagomma) with rubber soles that allow for air circulation, and haven't had a single problem and nary a blister; (true, I've also continued to use Vick's vaporub on my feet instead of something else) The Valleverdes are decent-looking, weigh very little and don't need to be changed for city walking..<BR>
I've never seen Valleverdes in the States but, surely, there must be something similar. But again, they may not be suitable for everyone.<BR>
I would, however, recommend that the moment you land in Spain you go to a drugstore (they have them at the airport) and get some COMPEED blister and callus patches. They come in little blue-green packages and every pilgrim that I've met, all over the Camino, for four years, swears up and down by them. Apparently the trick is to put the patch on the very moment that you feel a blister developing, and not later. Although there are similar "second skin" and such blister aids in the States, reportedly they are not nearly as effective as the COMPEED ones sold in Spain.<BR>
Regards,<BR>
Rosina<BR>
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