Jury In for Luna Sandals?

[te – wa]

with an increasing popularity of barefoot hiking/running, camp shoe nirvana, and/or trendsetting ultracoolness, why haven't more of us discussed the Luna sandals?

http://lunasandals.com/sandals

[Diane “Piper” Soini]

Have any of us been hiking in Luna sandals? I saw a guy wearing them a few weeks ago. Personally, I am not sure I could stand the strap between my toes. I have made my own huaraches which I think are better than Barefoot Ted's (my straps don't come in contact with the ground) but still that strap between the toes can hurt sometimes.

I have been wearing Chaco sandals on lots of backpack trips. I did 66 miles of the PCT in northern California, 70+ miles on the JMT in August when there wasn't a lot of snow, 70 some-odd miles of the PCT near Big Bear and 60 some-odd miles of the PCT over San Jacinto plus lots of day hikes. They do not do very well in snow. Otherwise, I've been very happy wearing sandals. I just wish Chacos came with a real hiking boot tread. I have slipped a lot and end up hiking very carefully for fear of falling.

I've been considering getting some of those Unshoes and gluing on my own hiking boot sole or continuing to try and make my own hiking sandals and shoes. I've made a lot of them and have had some pretty good successes. It feels nice to hike in minimal footwear, whether that means the freedom of sandals or the thinness of a minimal sole. Sometimes it's nice to have a thicker sole and in my opinion, it's always nice to have good traction and be able to handle whatever the trail throws at me, including leftover patches of snow.

[drowning in spam]

Diane, thanks for that link. The upcoming Pah Tempe looks promising because it'd be their first model without a strap between the toes. I'm glad it's not out already or I'd have buyers remorse over my Waldies that just got delivered a couple days ago. If their lightest Wokova Feather in size 12M weighs 6 ounces per pair, I have to wonder how much the Pah Tempe will weigh. They do say that the sole will be 10mm instead of 5mm to prevent toe flop problems…although that wouldn't be a problem if you glued a boot sole to it.

[Ginger Allman]

My husband hikes in homemade huaraches. He wrote about his experiments on Damien Tougas' ToeSalad site. (If you're into minimalist shoes, be sure to have a nose around there. Lots of good info.)

http://www.toesalad.com/articles/hiking-in-huaraches

[BlackHatGuy]

Hey Diane, did you get my PM?

[Author]

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