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Steel Toe Boots Not For Travel

Steel toed boots bad for travel While I highly recommend Carhartt boots — or other suitable heavy duty work boots — I strongly advise against trying to travel with boots that have steel toes.  My reasons for this are as follows: 1. Most travelers are not going to be doing work which requires steel toes, [...]

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Steel toed boots bad for travel

While I highly recommend Carhartt boots — or other suitable heavy duty work boots — I strongly advise against trying to travel with boots that have steel toes.  My reasons for this are as follows:

1. Most travelers are not going to be doing work which requires steel toes, so they are not beneficial in the least.

2. A traveler’s footwear needs to be suitable for a variety of different climates, and steel toes are a death sentence for your feet in cold climates and they increase the core temperature of the shoe in high weather. Truly, sleeping outside in the cold while wearing steel toe boots has been amongst the worst experiences that I have ever had in travel.

3. The steel toes can create discomfort when hiking. Again, I have done severe damage to my feet while hiking or walking long distances in steel toe work boots. Simply put, the steel toes can cut into your feet when walking up and down inclines — mountains — and they also make the boot vastly heavier.

4. Steel toe boots are much heavier to heave around the world. So if you want to remove your boots and carry them in your pack, you are adding two useless steel chucks to the weight of your travel gear. As mentioned in the above example, steel toe boots can also weigh down your feet when hiking.

In all, steel toe boots are an unnecessary piece of travel gear and should be avoided. A good pair of non steel toe work boots are excellent for travel, but make sure that there is no steel in the toe areas, or else you may be in for some severe discomfort in your travels.

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Additional resources

Carhartt work boots for travel

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Original question about Carhartt work boots

I was wondering where i can find that kind of carhartt boots. Everyone’s I have come across have been steel toe. Here in Kentucky we get bad winters and steel toes will freeze my feet off. Id greatly appreciate it if you could e-mail a link to buy some carhartt boots just like the ones on your website that is not steel toe.( https://www.vagabondjourney.com/2008-travel-blog/1010-carhartt-work-boots-travel.shtml ). Thank you for your time

Filed under: Clothing, Travel Gear, Travel Help

About the Author:

I am the founder and editor of Vagabond Journey. I’ve been traveling the world since 1999, through 91 countries. I am the author of the book, Ghost Cities of China and have written for The Guardian, Forbes, Bloomberg, The Diplomat, the South China Morning Post, and other publications. has written 3699 posts on Vagabond Journey. Contact the author.

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  • Ron Bannon January 10, 2012, 3:39 pm

    Thanks for sharing your experience—I will be sure to heed your advice! And I was seriously considering buying boots with a steal toe, now I’ll opt for ones without the steel.

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