Columbia Redmond Mid Waterproof

A good middle of the road lightweight waterproof hiking shoe that has nice sticky rubber on the soles that would make these an acceptable approach shoe.

As I have gotten older I have drifted away from heaver hiking boots and gone to trail runners for much of my backpacking in the summer, but I would still like to find a shoe that is a little more robust than a trail runner, but has plenty cushion and is close to the weight of a trail runner.

I normally don't consider Columbia shoes as I have always found them to run very narrow and never seem to have any wide sizes, but recently I noticed that the Columbia Redmond Mid Waterproof shoes now are available in wide sizes so I decided to give them a try.

The Columbia Redmond shoes have a very similar style to many of the other lightweight hiking shoes available today and have the Columbia Omni-Tech waterproof breathable seam sealed liner, Omni-Grip soles, and Techlite midsoles.

I have had the shoes for a couple of months now and have been mainly using them on day trips on local trails and for the most part have been very happy with the shoe.

While I purchased the wide version of the shoe it still feels narrow, but the fit is acceptable and I am liking the shoe more and more as I wear them. The overall narrowness of the shoe seems somewhat unique compared to other shoes that I own and they have more of a rock shoe feel and I could see these being a good alternative as an approach shoe.

The soles are made from Columbia's Omni-Grip material and seem to be sticky like rock shoe and have adequate lugs for traction on the trail.

While in general the sole is more than acceptable, there are some areas where it could be improved. The first area for improvement would be to have the area under the big toe/ball of your foot have larger lugs along the edge of the sole instead of the small thin lugs that are present on the existing sole (upper right part of the sole in the picture below). This would enhance the shoe by giving it some capability to edge and make it competitive as a real approach shoe.

The other area of the sole that is pointing out is the cross section under the heel which is narrow and has large radiuses edges.  When I first put on the shoe it felt like I was going to roll my heel/ankle. That sense of potentially rolling my heel has subsided as I have worn the shoe more, but if you are someone concerned about rolling your heel/ankle you would want to take this into account before picking up this shoe.

In the picture below I placed the Columbia Redmond shoe next to my Keen Siskiyou Mids that are the same size and you can see that the contact patch of the Keen is significantly greater than the Columbia shoe.  I actually measured the width of the sole in contact with the table for each of the shoes and the Keen had 50% more contact (2 3/8" for the Columbia and 3 3/8" for the Keen).

The weight for a pair of Columbia Redmonds in a size 10 1/2 Wide was 1 pound 15 ounces, which is pretty light when compared to my Keens of the same size which weigh 2 pounds 12 ounces and not to much greater then my Hoka One One trail runners at 1 pound 5 ounces. Overall the Columbia Redmonds are a nice light shoe that I find myself wearing more and more.

I live in the Northwest and have been wearing these shoes regularly in wet conditions and have not had any issues with the Omni-Tech waterproof liner leaking leaking, but the shoes are still relatively new so if they're still not leaking next fall then I'll be happy and call Omni-Tech a winner.

The Techlite midsoles have a significant amount of cushion, which is something I am always looking for in shoes I purchase now days and are very comfortable to wear on a full day of hiking. 

With the exception of the very rounded heel on the Columbia Redmond, I really like this shoe and would recommend it to anyone looking for a lightweight hiking shoe that has ample cushioning.