User Review: Lowa Scout II

Lowa Scout II
Above: The current Scout II, which may differ slightly from the version reviewed.

Reviewed August 17, 2004 by Frank Wilson

Rating: rated 5 of 5 stars
Materials: Leather
Use: Moderate to challenging day hikes
Break-in Period: Walked around the house, and about a mile walk in our neighorhood.
Weight: 4 lbs 5.5 ozs (Mens 9.5, per digital postal scale)
Price Paid: $200

This review is based on only one outing with these boots. I'll come back in a couple of months and update it. My wife and I took up hiking seriously about seven months ago. I've had nothing but problems with my feet since we started, basically becuase I didn't know anything about buying hiking boots.

I started out using my Red Wing work boots (BIG mistake). After suffering blisters and hammered toes, I bought a pair of Vasque Clarions. These are fairly lightweight boots, and they were okay, but didn't really suit my feet. I still continued to suffer toe pain (sometimes severe), and felt like the boots were just too flexible for the tough, rocky terrain that we typically hike.

Last Saturday I bought a pair of Lowa Scout II boots. ven though I know you are not supposed to go on a difficult hike (or any long hike) in new boots, we went off to the Savage Gulf trail area in central Tennessee Sunday.

We took a light 2.9 mile trail as a starter, just to make sure that the new boots weren't going to kill our feet (my wife also had new boots). Everything went fairly well that first section. My right foot is a little larger than my left, and I experienced a little tightness above my right toes, but nothing like the discomfort that I had felt with my previous boots.

We had the choice of completing our hike via a fairly easy 4.1 mile trail, or going down into the 'gulf' for 4.9 miles. This trail is so difficult that it is not recommended for day hikers, but we had done it in the reverse direction two weeks ago. It is very rocky and includes steep down and up hill climbs.

We both felt comfortable enough to go for the gulf. I really hammered the steep rocky downhill that goes into the gulf, just to see how the boots handled it. I was very pleasently surprised. I was afraid that I would never find a pair of hiking boots that didn't hurt my feet. The new Lowa Scout II boots performed wonderfully.

As we walked, they got more and more confortable. The left boot (on my smaller foot) started out and stayed very comfortable. The right boot loosened up quite a bit as it began to break in. By the end of the hike, I only had slight pressure on my little toe, and it was noticable, but not a big problem.

I'll report progress as I continue to break these boots in, but for now, I'm a very happy hiker.

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