Back in August I made a last minute purchase (at full price, to boot) of a pair of Patagonia Huckleberry shoes. These represent my first Patagonia item of any kind, mostly because their stuff is typically too expensive for me to afford (though now that I've read "Let my people go surfing" I understand why that's the case a little better). This pair was meant to replace my 5.10 Prodigy approach shoes, which had two problems: the soles were showing crazy wear after less than a year of use, and they were too wide to be comfortable. Even as I was trying shoes on, I was impressed with the fact that Patagonia sizes came in increments of half a Euro size. This meant I could get a nearly custom fit, which is a huge deal to me, as my two feet are nearly half a US size apart, causing me a world of hassle. With no break-in period whatsoever, I wore the Huckleberries on my entire trip to Greece, plane to plane, so to speak, with a 2000m full backpack & climbing rack ascent in-between. They fit better than any approach shoe I've ever tried, and I love them. However... and this is a big "but": excellent hiking/backpacking shoes though they are, they are not, in my opinion, sticky enough to be good approach shoes. My confidence on slabs is seriously diminished over what it was in the 5.10s. Ditto my traction on any kind of ice, as I found descending the Owen's gully a couple weekends ago. This is to be expected, I suppose, since the Huckleberries have more durable, hence less sticky rubber soles, compared to the Stealth C4 on the 5.10s. So it seems I've struck the heart of the trade-off: sticky rubber vs durable rubber.
Even though I love these shoes in every other way, the lack of stickiness is a huge con in my mind. What I wanted was specifically an approach shoe (which is what the Huckleberries are advertised as). Tremendous fit! Clearly superior workmanship! But if the approach shoe don't stick ... well, then, what's the point?
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