Merrell Passage Ventilator

I bought a Merrell Passage Ventilator Lo from an eBay seller. This shoe is among my best light hiking shoes, ranking with my other favorite, a pair of Montrail TRS Comp.

There are only two bad things about Passage Ventilator, both of them easily correctable.

First, Merrell's "air cushion" insoles are lousy. The answer? Pull a pair of insoles out of some Montrail hiking shoes and replace the Merrell insole with them! It works like a charm.

The other bad thing is that the laces Merrell puts in the shoes are too stretchy. You can replace them with a better set of laces, like I did.

Passage Ventilator will do OK in light rain, but don't walk through puddles or your feet will get wet. It's also a fast-drying shoe. And it has one of the best feels that I've ever felt in a hiking shoe: plenty of room in the toes and none of that foot-in-a-vise feeling that you get from overly narrow shoes.