Prior to 2008 or so I lived in Chaco sandals, like many others. They were comfy, good for most things so long as they weren’t too technical (in any direction), and exceptionally durable. When I got into backpacking in earnest and moved to relatively minimalist shoes, arch support quickly became intolerable, something that has remained true to this day. Easy enough to negoitate with trail shoes, avoiding arch support makes ski boots problematic, and too this day I cannot wear Chacos, they feel like I’m perches atop a golf ball. Until 2017 I flailed around failing to find an adequate sport sandal substitute, at which point Bedrock sandals entered my life. I still have, and wear, that pair of Cairns. They got a resole 2 years ago, and rather like Chacos, the midsole and straps seem like they’ll last another resole with little problem.

In fairness, here in Montana sandals don’t get the year round use (for me) they did when we lived in Arizona or Utah. M (still) does virtually all her outdoor stuff in Chacos, while I’ve always wanted a bit more of an enveloping, secure shoe for the more demanding half of my hiking. Cairns are great chill boat shoes (so long as you sunblock your feet), but if there is much of a chance I’ll need to pull a boat off a rock I prefer Rasslers. The other blind spot, for Cairns in particular, is office wear. There’s just a bit too much entrenched oddity against visible toes, that in my day job I don’t feel inclined to poke. There is no midsole and overall ground feel , of any shoe ever, that I prefer to Cairns, so when Bedrock launched their Mountain Clogs a ~year ago, and I futzed just long enough for them to go out of stock, was bummed all summer, and very motivated to buy a pair when they went back into stock this fall.

Thankfully that meant I got a pair of sage green suede ones, size 12. The nubuck leather ones look great, but I’m intending to defy M’s expectations that wearing them without socks will make them horrid and stinky. My feet don’t sweat much anyway, and the 3D mesh lining in the suede ones should help with socklessness. I waxed (with SnoSeal) my pair after a few weeks, which has worn in and isn’t nearly as shiny as in the photo above, and has helped a lot to repel water, oil, dirt, and thus avoid the staining to which the raw suede seemed prone.

My Cairns are size 11, and I wear 11.5 in the vast majority of conventional shoes. Size 12 Cairns would give my toes more protection, while likely putting the toe post too far forward (I have long toes and low volume feet, the front two adjustors on my Cairns are close to maxed closed). 12 was the right choice with the clogs, I can wear fairly thick socks with plenty of toe room, and have happily done so all winter, every day at the office, most days to the office provided the snow or puddles aren’t too deep, and pretty much everywhere else in town. As expected, they are great if someone heavy hut slippers for cabin trips.

The mountain clogs are also the very definition of hipster shoes, insofar as hipster can be defined as an ethos more taken with the appearance and contemplation of a thing, over and above the nitty gritty of actually doing it. A significant majority of the bikes on the Radavist, for example. Lifestyle is another, near, synonym. The Bedrock clogs have burly tread, good materials, and a build that should last a decade or more, all in a package that for me inherently comes up short for any actual outdoor pursuit. Absent the toe post of their sandals, the only thing keeping your foot located fore-aft is tension on the top strap, and for me it is quite easy to crank this and create a pressure point (folks with higher volume feet might experience this less, though I doubt that would solve the issue entirely). The result being that I find the clogs entirely unsuitable for any walk with a substantive amount of steepness, sole traction outstripping stability within the shoe several times over. In a similar vein the clogs aren’t bad for riding a bike, in that the broad, flat sole and 50/50 positive/negative tread grips pedals well enough. I’ve not tried truly technical riding in them, under the I think compelling assumption that I’d run out of foot support and have my toes thwacking the ends regularly. They’re also not stiff enough for my flat pedal singletrack preferences.

Which leaves a supremely comfy, most weather shoe that is ideal for most anything short of either formalwear or proper outdoor pursuits. Some have cast aspersions on the clogs appearance, “nature druid dad” being amogst the gentlest. That fits my vibe just fine, with M being a positive neutral about them generally, an opinion that slides to the other side of neutral when worn with shorts. To provide further context, the Astral PFD sandals are the only footwear (and I think the only apparel period) to which she has given a flat hell no in the past two decades.

I anticipate the chunky greenie meanies being my most worn shoe, for any given month and for many years to come.