I've been trying some of the various mostly-fabric options with stiff sole and rand: Scarpa charmoz and la sportiva evo with the leather panels. They are certainly light, but a bit cold, confining, and not as good on the ankles as full grain leather. They are fine empty, but a bit soft when loaded off-trail.

The rands on these light boots take a beating in rock, and they have a tough time staying glued on where your foot flexes. I wore a heavily beeswaxed pair of Alico Guides (roughout 3mm leather Norwegian welt waffle stompers, bought for $179 from STP back in '04) on four AK sheep hunts; they needed a midsole rebuild with resole once in that time, but never a mark or cut on the leather, and the hunts were almost exclusively on glacier rock and shale (that's what ate through the vibram into the midsole at the arch). Made me a believer in waxed leather, and a skeptic of rands.

I'm not inclined to heavily wax a leather boot with a molded sole or a rand - I'm leery of delamination, whether by solvent or oil from the commercial waxes (obenhaufs or pitch blend or whatever), or by heat when applying straight beeswax. I'm pretty convinced that my Alicos lasted as long as they did due to the heavy pure beeswax coating. Any rock contact slipped right off and left a superficial mark that went away with more wax applied, no leather damage. They are stiff, and the resole shrunk them a bit so I no longer use them. They never were all that comfortable with the folded bellows tongue, so I'll avoid that in the future. Sure protected the feet though, and you could step wherever you want, on whatever you want, wearing whatever load you want, and you'd stick.

Going to try a couple of as-new ebay boots that might be older than me - pivetta eiger and another similar older European Littleway-welted roughout FGL boot by ML, whoever they were/are. Stitched construction so I can beeswax them with heat and they'll resole without destruction, narrower sole than the Norwegian welt so a bit lighter, and a sewn bellows on the tongue instead of a fold, so they should mold more easily to my foot tops, one of which is a bit tender with a bony spur. We'll see how they work.

Otherwise, I'm attracted to the La Sportiva Pamir, but there's that rand again, and I hear it's a bit soft.

Last edited by Vek; 02/08/16.