Day 34: Stage 29: Mont-de-Marsan

17 km, mostly cloud, some sun, 20°

Planned Obsolescence?😅

It was much bluer this morning when I first stuck my head out of the window. By the time we had breakfast and geared up clouds had started to show. I thought it made a nice sunrise picture.

Today was a short stage by design. We thought it would be nice to have the afternoon in Mont-de-Marzan to get our chores taken care of so that tomorrow could be a truly free day.

After walking the roads for a while the chemin took us onto another bicycle trail, this time a paved bicycle trail.

This meant another 17 km on pavement.😑

Not the most exciting walking, so we talked all the way into town.

Some things are just the same all over the world. This boy and his mom we’re checking out a chicken through the fence.

I thought this store might be interesting to go into. I’ve always wondered what ‘a just for men’ store would look like.

While we were walking into town we heard a lot of jets taking off. I knew that there was an airport to the west of us, but I hadn’t expected to hear the planes as loudly as we did. It turns out that was a military base, and the planes taking off were fighter jets. We’ve seen them zipping overhead from time to time. So fast! They made quite a racket, but no one in town seemed fazed at all. I suppose you get used to it. Just like I saw in Italy the past two years, the EU has raised its readiness status just in case Russia and Putin become even more aggressive.

The locals also seem to put little dogs in the window. What’s that about, right?

I’ve been making a few passing comments about the condition of my boot soles. You might recall this picture from just before I left when the boots had about 50 km on them.

This is what they look like today. They now have about 900 km on them. It’s very typical for walking shoes or boots to wear heavily on the outside heels when one is carrying a pack. It’s just the unusual weight distribution.

We still have another 135 km to walk just to get to SJPDP at the base of the Pyrenees. It will be interesting to see if they make it that far. The uppers are in excellent shape. I’m afraid that Salomon made the soles of these boots, thinner than the 2 prior models I’ve used. No doubt done to make the overall boot lighter and less expensive to manufacture. For reference, I used the last version of these boots to walk 1800 km to Rome along the Via Francigena and those boots were in better shape when I reached Rome than this pair. I abandoned those boots in Rome, and I doubt that this pair will ever see Canada again. No, that’s not a threat.😎

Fortunately, I still have a pair of the last generation boots at home waiting. I believe they might be the last new pair of size 11 boots from that generation left in Canada.🇨🇦 Perhaps in the world! 🌎😊

So tomorrow is a quieter day. We have the luxury of a washing machine in the apartment that we’ve rented for the next two nights, and it’s getting a nice workout right now. We had a nice lunch on our way into town and we will shortly be going outside to see what we can scrounge up for dinner. Annemarie and I always enjoy doing that.

That’s about it for today. I plan to post something tomorrow about this town. I’m sure there must be something to see here, right?

Bon Chemin!

Geoff 🥾🚶‍♂️🚶‍♀️🚷