New shoes

Raving about french fashion is about as interesting and novel as complaining about the Mayor of Toronto. We aren’t living in Paris but there is a clearly a fashion-vibe running through Provence. In the clothing markets in Aix-en-Provence there are plenty of amazing scarves and gauzy dresses from which to choose.

Within about 48 hours of arriving we realized how useless our kids’ neoprene lined Keen sandals were in this hot and arid climate so bought them birkenstocks instead. I’ve been eyeing new shoes too. Recently I engaged in some retail therapy.

C’est tres sexy, n’est pas?

Apologizes to readers expecting to see some swanky high heels but our village is at the base of Mount Saint Victoire. This mountain, made famous by Paul Cezanne, has over 1000 m in elevation and a trail that starts about 5 minutes uphill from our house.

Since we arrived three weeks ago we’ve taken four hikes. The first one didn’t even make the french classification for a “hike” – it was a mere “walk” but it sure felt like 30 minutes of hiking uphill to us until we reached our destination. Next we hiked up the trail out the back of our village. And we’ve also done two hikes with the girls who are good sports about the adventures but talk a lot about how “HOT IT IS HERE!!!”.  But it’s our French Water Dog who might be having the most fun of all of us! He needs a new collar so maybe we’ll get him one with polka dots in honour of his new mountain dog status.

As a new hiker I am enjoying hiking but find them challenging in two ways. Going up, physically, is a decent work out. Coming down is a mental challenge, a bit like solving a puzzle trying to figure out where to go and how not to wipe out. I was laughing the other day at all the time and money I wasted in university days at STEP fitness classes when I should have just been walking uphill.

Next time I post about shoes I promise I’ll try for something a bit more fashionable.