Note Number 8… These Boots were Made for Walking but not in the rain…

In October last year (2015) I bought a fab pair of Joules wellies in Mole Valley Farmers in South Molton. I loved them, all purple pink and flowery and they were fun to wear. Sadly, less than a year later they leaked, I couldn’t believe it and they’d hardly had any use.

I tweeted to Mole Valley and to Joules and was impressed by the speed with which they replied and I was offered a full refund on said wellies and managed to replace them with another pair which were twice the price but did the job properly. The power of the Tweet eh?

I don’t like walking the dog in wellies I prefer walking boots as it’s much easier to stride out around the countryside, but, of course one needs waterproof walking boots in this climate so I bought a pair of Hi-Tec Borah Peak Waterproof, Women’s Hiking Boots.

The important word here is WATERPROOF… which they were for about three walks. I sprayed them with a waterproof spray but that didn’t work so I phoned Amazon and was told to send them back for a refund. Fortunately we’d kept the box. This was back in March 2016 and we were about to head off to Italy – where the sun shines most of the time incidentally – so I didn’t bother to replace them immediately.

Back in England at the beginning of November, having replaced the wellies,  it was time to also get sorted with new boots. I decided to go the whole hog and buy an expensive pair of Ecco boots, waterproofed with Hydromax© lovely but £160. They were really comfortable and I loved walking in them…but, you can guess what I’m going to say can’t you? I couldn’t believe it the first time when I took them off after a walk and my socks were wet. I decided I must have imagined it and that I had stood on the wet doormat in my socked feet after I’d taken the boots off. So the second time I made sure that I didn’t do anything like it that but…my socks and feet were WET!

Back to the shop I went and to the very helpful staf.  They thought the boots were faulty so took them back and said they would send for another pair. Needless to say, I had lost confidence and insisted they replaced them with a different pair of boots made from Gortex©…this they duly did (at the same price). Success!  I am now able to walk over the muddy wet fields and in the puddles along the road with my feet staying dry. How wonderful.

But, wet shoes were only a part of this November. After a weekend away we returned to a cottage with a completely flooded ground floor. Apparently the rain had come down persistently and then in bucket loads of biblical proportion, the road looking like a river, and being the first house after the corner and at the end of a slight downhill segement of road, the water had nowhere else to go but in through the side gate, filling up the garden like a lake and found its way into the cottage under the door…

Lefthand photo…carpet with muddy water partly sucked out…the dark bit was what the whole carpet looked like before any removal of water.  Righthand photo…rolled up carpet ready to be dragged out and thrown into the garden. (it was very heavy!)  It’s hard to see how wet it all was from these pictures. This was with about 2 inches of water, I cannot imagine what it must be like when houses are flooded half way up the walls…horrible.

Ah well, at least I could wear me wonderful wellies to paddle about in the house.

In case you’re worried, it’s all dry now and we await a new carpet which should be down by Christmas. Thank goodness for good neighbours who came to the rescue with hot meals and comforting words. The dog had to stay in the kennels for an extra night, but I don’t think she realised this…she doesn’t seem to know the days of the week very well.

So far in 2016 we’ve suffered from earthquakes in Italy and flooding in England…what next I wonder?