Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Backpack Hunting Lightweight vs heavy boots?

Got home yesterday. The summary is 600+ miles hiked, 15 miles/day average with one zero day, started 4/11 and finished a couple days ago. We went from the border at Crazy Cook monument to Ghost Ranch in northern NM. We weren’t able to do the last section to the CO border, roughly 100 trail miles, due to the massive snow load in the southern Rockies. We did get a good taste of it going from Cuba up and over San Pedro Parks Wilderness. Unbelievably wet up there. Postholing thigh deep. Got caught in a storm. Very cold, very wet. There’s a reason folks stay out of the high country during big melts- it’s miserable up there. Not much fun; we felt better about the decision not to proceed into the mountains north of Ghost Ranch.

As pertains to this thread and as promised, my shoe. I ended up using the same pair for the whole hike. I would’ve switched out after this damage but it wasn’t feasible. The logistics of gear problems on the trail are formidable. Will explain if anyone cares. So, this happened on very sharp lava and falls under the operator error category- with the obvious caveat that a more stoutly-constructed (heavier) shoe would’ve likely fared better. When it first happened I naively tried to reinforce it with Tenacious Tape, which is remarkable stuff, but not THAT remarkable.



When we got to the ranger station at Malpais we sat at a picnic table and I was able to use a #8 fishhook as a needle and reinforce that very important rubber “finger” with a single loop of heavy braided fishing line. This was really difficult. It held until Grants, about 40-50 miles if memory serves.



In Grants we did our zero day so my wife could try to get her injured toe to calm down (it did not) and I bought a heavy curved repair needle at Walmart and did this. The mesh isn’t really structural per se, but it still seemed wise to back up the loops I put in the rubber “finger”.



When we got home yesterday the grass was thigh-high so I mowed in them. The repairs are still holding. In total the repairs held for almost 200 miles over all manner of terrain and many water and snow crossings.



FWIW, nobody and I mean nobody was using anything other than low tops. Mostly Altras. One guy used them with an ankle brace because he “has had a bad ankle since he was a kid”…… make of this intel what you will.

I lost 20 pounds on this hike. Hit the scale at 186 yesterday. I never thought I’d see 180-anything again in this life! Got seriously tan. Pics upon request. It was an incredible adventure.

Happy trails everyone.