Ribelle Lite OD

 

Product Description

Scarpa Ribelle Lite OD

I have always used leather boots as my main mountain boots, in recent years these have been Scarpa’s SL Active range and usually with 2 pairs of socks for “Scottish” winters! The passage of time (and lots of comments by others!) had convinced me to make a change with my next pair of boots.

According to Scarpa the manufacturer, the Ribelle Lite has an innovative curved shape, a TPU crampon insert on the heel making it compatible with the use of C2 semi-automatic crampons as well as C1 walking crampons and is ideal for technical trekking, via ferrata routes and alpinism.

The first time I saw the bright orange colouring (and stripes!) of the boot in a photo on the internet I thought, “There’s no way I would buy those”.
However, after trying on a number of similar products and finding them all uncomfortable, I walked into a shop in Covent Garden (London) and saw a pair of these sitting on the shelf.
“No harm in trying them on,” I thought, “just for a comparison”.

Straight away, I realised that they were much more comfortable than any other boots I had tried on.
Just to be sure, I tried on all the others again but it wasn’t long before I was walking out the door with my new (orange) boots.

The first time out of the box that I wore them was in Scotland.
It was a wet and grey day in Glen Elchaig and we had planned a short walk along the flat estate road. “If they hurt, we can turn back”, was my reasoning.

Nearly 12 miles later, we returned to the car!
The boots had splashed through muddy puddles and sodden turf (whilst avoiding Highland cattle) with no dampness on the inside.

For brand new boots, they were amazingly comfortable.
30 years ago, it took me a whole year and a lot of blisters to “break in” a new pair of boots but with these the worst I had was a slight rubbing on one little toe that I noticed towards the end of the day.
(I now think that was due to a poor choice of socks by me).

A rough coastal path and a 10 mile mountain circular route – with different socks and no rubbing – has convinced me that I made the right choice. The boots were comfortable to wear for long periods. They come higher up my leg than I am used to but this was still comfortable. It’s a good idea to loosen the laces at this point in order to have more ankle flexibility when walking.

Only regret is that I didn’t get to try them out with crampons in Scotland although, they work well on my back garden lawn!

Perfectly warm with one pair of socks so far too.

An excellent buy.

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