The love affair that gave new meaning to the Appalachian Trail has hit the skids.
GOP Rep. Mark Sanford of South Carolina announced on Friday that he and his Argentine fiancee, Maria Belen Chapur, were calling off their engagement and blamed his ongoing legal battles with his ex-wife for the breakup.
The revelation, which caught the political world off-guard, came some five years after Sanford, then South Carolina’s governor, revealed in a tearful press conference that he and Chapur had been having an affair.
The admission came after Sanford reappeared in public after vanishing for several days in June 2009. One of his aides told inquiring reporters that he was hiking the Appalachian Trail; he was actually in Argentina visiting Chapur.
In a rambling, nearly 2,400-word post on his Facebook page, Sanford blamed a custody battle between him and his ex-wife, Jenny, for creating tensions in his relationship with Chapur.
“No relationship can stand forever this tension of being forced to pick between the one you love and your own son or daughter, and for this reason Belen and I have decided to call off the engagement,” Sanford wrote.
He added: “Belen is a remarkably wonderful woman who I have always loved and I will be forever grateful for not only the many years we have known and loved each other, but the last six very tough ones wherein she has encouraged me and silently borne its tribulations with her ever warm and kind spirit.”
Jenny Sanford did not immediately respond to a request for comment.