The mrs wants to invest in some good hill walking boots, hopefully to last her a long time.

We went to blacks and found good fit in the Salomon range.
The decision though, is leather or not. She had wanted classic leather, like she’s borrowed before for walking the lakes, hope they’d last a good few decades for occasional hill walking mostly in the British isles. She does have a once in a lifetme trip to the Indonesian jungle coming up though and was sold on the more breathable modern fabrics, but will they last as well as leather? Any experiences out there?

and found good fit

Shirley gotta revolve around this.

I don’t know about jungle use, but definitely go for leather for UK use, as long as you look after them.

I’d say synthetic with gortex lining for waterproofness, they are much lighter and need minimal maintenance. I haven’t had a pair or leather walking shoes/boots for years. IME the inners go first or you just want another pair so replace them. My old North and Salomon boots and approach shoes I have worn the soles/inners out before the outer material.

FYI I have done some walking in Borneo / Malaysia / Vietnam and the leech socks (old fashioned cotton for proper jungle walks) together with water proofness, lightness and breath ability where the most important features.

If the fit was as good with either material I’d go for leather boots, they just take an absolute beating without complaint for year after year. I’ve just had mine resoled after 12 years use and they are as good as new, I may have been lucky but the inners are still in good nick too. it’s slightly superficial but they are also easier to clean up after they get properly caked too.

No doubt they can be heavier although Brasher do a leather boot called the Supalite which is unsurprisingly very light for a leather boot.

Best bit of advice I have is take your thick walking socks and get measured up. I wear a size 9, however I found out am a 9 1/2 A with a collapsed insole. I knew my daughter had freaky feet and now I know why. Out of about 50 options, salesman pointed to two and said, ” start here, with insole” left with lovely fitting fabric gortex boots.

Leather for long life. I’ve just had a pair of Scarpas resoled – they must be over 30 years old. Uppers still fine.

Having said that I know plenty of people who prefer lightweight fabric boots and I have no idea about the jungle. If it’s wet and muddy though – leather again.

Thanks, useful advice all. We did by the way find very good fit in both a leather and fabric model.
Has sort of confirmed our suspicions; leather will last longer, but fabrics have their benefits. Decision time.

Salamon do very good waterproof and summer boots. Synthetic all the way for me. They are lighter and breath well in the summer. Note that not all boots are designed waterproof. Summer, light weight ones wont be. Id sugest two boots, one for summer and a waterproof one for winter.

If you are going for leather boots to last for decades I would look for a traditional style leather boot that does not have the waterproof membrane so many have these days.

A modern leather boot (particularly lower budget ones) with goretex lining/membrane relies on the lining to make it waterproof rather than the construction of the leather. In my experience the lining never lasts long and the boot ends up leaking.

An older style boot relies on the quality of the leather and the construction to keep out the water and a good reproofing regime will keep them going for decades.

hope they’d last a good few decades for occasional hill walking mostly in the British isles

Define occasional. 10-15 hill days per year? Fabric for the win.

I’ve got some Innov8 lightweight boots with goretex inner. They’re horribly hot and sweaty compared with my Miendl leather boots without goretex.
The Miendls stay drier on a long day as the goretex holds in sweat.
For shorter walks up to a couple of hours the Innov8s are fine though.

My last pair of leather boots took 14 years of abuse.

They walked on their own by the end.

I replaced them with the same again.

Can walk for Days in them and not. Think twice about it, dont tend to wet through but dont take weeks to dry out. I wear mine not only in the hills but when im traveling with work (alot)as i tend to walk around where ever i end up on my down time up to about 20km at a time.

My mrs goretex boots take forever to dry comparitively.

Ive purposefully not named a brand as you need to go try shoes on and see whats comfy.

I’m sure I remember reading somewhere that gortex doesn’t work too well in v humid tropical environments. It’s designed to transport vapour from the most humid side of the membrane to the least humid and it’s not too fussy if that means away from you (in typical european climates) or towards you (in tropical v humid environments).

I’ve never really understood the goretex shoe thing. With jackets we are always told that keeping them clean is important for breathability, so unless the intention is to only walk on dry days the boots will pretty quickly get the mud/cow poo coating and stop breathing.

I am also a fan of leather boots.

What would Bear Grylls wear 😕

Think bigger….. What would Chuck Norris wear?

What would Guns ‘n’ Roses wear?

Leather boots? Over-rated for most UK use.

Leather boots for me but unlined ie well constructed abs with no goretex liner. I have always found the goretex liners wear out before the soles let alone the uppers. My favourite are Lowa Mountain Boots obviously as I found they fit my foot shape/size really well and were ideal for what I wanted plus gave fantastic ankle support for my dodgy ankles, more do than any modern material ones I tried on.