At last the time had come to get my trusty Zamberlans re-soled. I only had two weeks left before the next trip, so I took them to the local Mr Minit. I began to have doubts when the attendant showed me a selection of tread patterns, all of which were the sort of thing you find on the bottoms of trainers. I just couldn't get it through to him that they weren't trainers; if I had wanted trainers I would have bought trainers in the first place; and that I wanted to climb mountains in them. I was about to leave in disgust, but had one more look at his catalogue while he served another customer. There was a bit at the bottom of the page offering a re-soling service for boots, with genuine Vibram soles; just what I wanted! With some trepidation I left them to be sent away, stressing that they must be back in two weeks.

I picked them up with a few days to go, and on the face (or perhaps sole) of it, they looked fine. They did in fact survive the week's walking, but on the following trip we were climbing Clough Head from the old station at Threlkeld. Half way up a long, boggy slope, my left foot sank in to the ankle, and when I pulled it out half the sole stayed behind.

I tied it on with a spare lace and limped back to the car while Mark and Jerry continued the walk. That afternoon I had to go into Keswick to buy a new pair of boots. They were only £59 and instantly comfortable, but didn't offer nearly as much support as the Zamberlans.

I suppose the moral is that if you have specialised equipment you should use specialised people to repair it. After all, I wouldn't ask my local cycle centre to provide tyres for my car.

UPDATE - I have recently received the following e-mail from the PA to the chairman of the Minit Group:

I would like to send my apologies for your experience with Mr Minit. I work for The Minit Group who own Minit UK and was very unhappy to hear of your experience. I would like to rectify the situation.

Thank you Minit for having the courtesy to apologise to me. I shall not take matters any further.