I just looked at a photo of me with my montain mule 40 years ago made me laugh i dont know now how we did it. an old guy i used to work with used to say about anybody younger "brute strength and ignorance - Mostly ignorance!" I think perhaps he was right.
You are going to have to post that photo. Or were you littlepaul back then?
Definitely a smaller version than now when i figure out how to use the scanner i may just do that.
I am a little smaller than you (1.87m x 87kg), I have finally had to replace my Salomon Pro-trek 7 GTX boots, would have to be as close to perfect boot as is possible (very very light, insulated, gore-tex, semi-auto crampon compatible.....) shame they don't still do them. I have chosen pr Lowa Tibet Pro, slightly higher and fractionally heavier but still a light boot with all the features of my old ones, so far...brilliant.
NZ Army boots, the old black ones - John Bulls I think.
Not sure if they still use them, they did go to brown tramping style ones a while back.
I love them. Strong yet flexible, durable, comfortable, good ankle support, keep the water out (being a high cut helps).
Nope, they're not issuing John Bulls any more. I had a pair that were great for years, waterproof for at least 6 river crossings (shallow rivers mind you) and polished up great with nugget. In fact I wore them to work in the hospital when I started there as a med student! They collapsed down the back after a while though and I couldn't wear them any more, they started giving me bad blisters and achilles tendonitis :-(
I wouldn't normally go for these kind of boots http://www.kathmandu.co.nz/Product/33010 but they were reduced to $100 and I need some boots now and don't have the money for my "ideal boot" at the moment. Maybe I'll get a year out of them if I tread carefully...
I'd rather a $100 pair of boots that fit well over a $700 pair that don't.
A lot of the vibram sole/light leather or synthetic boots in the $200 - $400 range are buggered in sixty days or sometimes much less in our West Coast conditions where they are regularly wet & do a lot of rock & scree work. That equates to anything from $3 to $20 per daily wear for best to worst case scenarios.
If the $100 boots you linked to fitted & performed ok you would be on par or a winner if they lasted 30 days or longer. Did you buy a pair?
Yeah I bought them, went for a little walk to break them in and they seem comfy enough. They look better in real life than they do on that link.
I'm doing Robinson River - Lake Christabel next week which I see you have put up some photos of on this site.
