Of course, having the word “desert” in the name is a dead giveaway that the Danner Desert Acadia GTX boots were not originally designed for snow use, but the Gore-Tex liner kept my feet dry and warm with just regular mid-weight wool hiking\u00c2\u00a0socks in -10C weather.\u00c2\u00a0 My feet were warm even standing for extended peroids of time in deep snow.\u00c2\u00a0 The Vibram Sierra sole worked fine in loose snow and on packed snow, but on freshly snowplowed roads where the black ice had been exposed, they were crazy slippery.\u00c2\u00a0 Granted it’s ice, but my Danner 453 hikers actually had more traction on the same surface.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m not going to even get into whether siping the sole blocks like snow tires or using a harder\/softer compound would make them work better in a winter environment.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll be looking into whether Lowa or someone else makes a snow\/ice Gore-Tex boot.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Comfort and support-wise, it was like being back in my old Danner Fort Lewis boots, only lighter.\u00c2\u00a0 There is less ankle support than an all-leather boot, but they allow for more freedom of movement with fewer pressure points.\u00c2\u00a0 The tunnel-style speed lace loops work much better at speed lacing\u00c2\u00a0than the mountaineering-boot-style D-ring tabs on the Fort Lewis boots.\u00c2\u00a0 From the warmth standpoint, I think the more breathable fabric and suede outer may actually be warmer than a full-leather boot because they allow the Gore-Tex membrane to breathe so much better, and warmth and moisture are inversely related.\u00c2\u00a0 The newer fiberglass shank, although not as stiff as\u00c2\u00a0a legacy steel shank, probably doesn’t\u00c2\u00a0conduct heat away from the underside of the foot through the sole.\u00c2\u00a0 The sizing was about right, both in width and length, and the arches are in the right location for my feet.\u00c2\u00a0 For dedicated warm\/dry-weather use, I’d probably get the non-Gore-Tex version of these a half size down for use with thinner socks.<\/p>\n
Construction is top-notch.\u00c2\u00a0 You really can’t beat Danner’s USA-made boots for quality.\u00c2\u00a0 The resoleability is nice, but I don’t know if I’ll ever realize that, since by the time the soles are worn out,\u00c2\u00a0the uppers of my boots are often fairly well trashed.\u00c2\u00a0 Danner makes some non-resoleable USA-made boots, but the price point is in the same ballpark, and the weight is not significantly lighter, so the only really clear advantage to those is a thinner sole.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00c2\u00a0These Danners are definitely good boots, just not on ice.\u00c2\u00a0 I’ll add more to this later after I get some more varied trail use on them.<\/p>\n
Tentatively, Three-and-a-half out of four gear monkeys<\/p>\n
Highly Recommended<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Of course, having the word “desert” in the name is a dead giveaway that the Danner Desert Acadia GTX boots were not originally designed for snow use, but the Gore-Tex liner kept my feet dry and warm with just regular mid-weight wool hiking\u00c2\u00a0socks in -10C weather.\u00c2\u00a0 My feet were warm even standing for extended peroids […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[9,13,16,18],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paJYlx-1pl","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5415"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5415\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studionewmedia.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}