Even in the past 20 years or so. When I first started winter hiking the norm was full crampons and either Sorrels or full plastic boots--or nope. These days many of us use silicone-based microspikes with single-layer boots for a lot of purposes and they're fine.
It depends on your needs. I still have some big plastics for step-in crampons so my single-layer winter boots are just some mild duty Merrell's (in maybe wide?--which is what I need in some circumstances). Just go to an REI or another more specialty store and try some on with winter-type socks.
Honestly not sure of the best recommendations these days. And depends if you go above treeline and/or do winter backpacks.
Cheers. What I’d like to find is something that’s zero-lift, warm enough for zero-degree weather, and handles ice well (your mention of silicone-based nubbies is what caught my eye). Kind of a niche (maybe impossible?) product, but my sandals don’t do me so well in the snow :)
It depends which zero scale. For zero F I'd want a double-layer boot whether Sorrel-type, plastics, or high-end single layer boot.
For zero C (32 F), there are a lot of boots that are fine for day hikes. The main limitation of something like microspikes vs. full crampons is that they only work well up to a certain angle at which point they don't really work for hard ice.
Oh, duh, Fahrenheit (my bad). Yeah, I’ve got a pair of Sorel’s now. (My goodness, the number of styles have exploded since I was a lad!) Angle isn’t really much of an issue, the terrain is pretty flat where I’m at. Thanks for the advice! Appreciated.
I'm not sure Sorels are as good as they used to be. But, yeah, for not super steep hiking they're great (you can't really front point). And you can even carry an extra pair of liners for backpacking. For flat these days, they're great for microspikes. When I was getting started in winter hiking, it's what most people used. I only got plastics when I started doing some real mountaineering.
You can't really go wrong with Sorels especially for non-high angle hiking. I've actually been an instructor in winter hiking programs.
