New boots and panties

Talk about chalk and cheese; we make an odd couple, the unerringly handsome María Inés de la Cruz and I. Whilst I loiter around La Villa Ramblanista in spandex trousers and a big, baggy t-shirt looking like a cross between Nena and Joey Tempest’s twin sister, she’s preening her thick black tresses and gazing at herself in the mirror, the spitting image of ... well, I’ll leave that to your imagination.

So you can imagine her surprise when I announced I was about to purchase a brand new pair of boots. And not just the cheap tat I usually buy; when I said I was forking out one hundred and ten of your English pounds she very nearly fainted. Then I said they were hiking boots; if looks could kill ...

Poor María, she never will understand. She’ll never understand the unrequited love a Ramblanista has for her hiking boots; she’ll never quite comprehend why I’m so reluctant to part with my now decrepit pair of Karrimor boots – seventy quid from Great Western Camping in Dorchester – that have been laced to my feet for more than a thousand of your English miles, along the Camino de Santiago and beyond. Listen, if she had her way they’d be out with the refuse, awaiting collection by the oxymoronically-titled Somerset Waste Partnership. 

The old boots - can you feel the love?

So I never let them out of my sight, not even now I have a go-faster pair of boots, purchased from the lovely shop assistant at Wells Outdoors – get yourself a website and start tweeting, Mr Wells Outdoors!

You know what they say about the sudden manifestation of children destroying an ideal relationship? We might say the same about my new boots. It didn’t help when I joked about wearing them in bed because the insufferably handsome María Inés de la Cruz knew perfectly well I was only half-joking. When my boots and I returned, yesterday, from our inaugural stroll together – along the thin tongue of higher ground which separates West Sedge Moor and Curry Moor – she retreated to the bedroom, slamming the door behind her shouting ‘you’d better make your mind up, Juanita – it’s the boots or me’.

She’ll calm down. Strange thing is that although she took the gin with her, I didn’t really care. I sat myself down on the sofa and spent the remainder of the evening ogling my new boots.

The new boots - if these don't get your lovejuices flowing nothing will