Buyers' Guide - Mountain Trousers

Of course you can wear shorts all year round, if that's your thing, but most mountain walkers and scramblers will be back to long trousers non-summer months and strangely, they're hard things to get right. Here are our tips to help you sort out the pants from the pantaloons...

Just as with your upper half, you can layer on your legs using water or windproof overtrousers to cover your basic legwear, however because your legs are constantly moving, many walkers and climbers find overtrousers restrictive so are looking for a day-long solution that combines ease of movement, breathability and basic weather protection.

Does such a thing exist? The good news is that softshell fabrics arguably work better for legwear than anywhere else making the 21st Century the golden age of mountain trousers :-)

Cut's always going to be a personal issue, but what you're after is something that's snug enough not to billow around irritatingly, but also designed to allow freedom of movement for high steps and those dramatic bridging moves on easy scrambles.

With a stretch fabric, that's not an issue, but elsewhere look for articulated knees, perhaps with stretch panels and crotch areas cut to allow movement. It may look odd, but when buying, try stretching, moving, lifting your knees high and make sure there's no obstruction to mobility.

Also make sure the waist is snug enough to stay put - belts or adjusters can help here - and that there's nothing that's going to rub unpleasantly under a hip-belt or harness.

Articulated knees and stretch fabrics are great for mobility. Poor cut can rub and impede movement, especially on scrambles.

There are plenty of extras out there in pants land. Some are genuinely useful, others are really just gimmicks.

Vents can be really good for cooling off and increase the range of useability. We like easy to use zip vents in the thigh area which make a real difference to comfort when things get hot.

Fastenings at the waist come in different shapes and sizes. Press studs sometimes pop open and even rip out, simply buttons work well, but can also come unstitched, Velcro tends to eat things. All are viable, but arguably best backed up with a belt.

Ankle adjustment can be handy, particularly if you're someone who like a snig fit around your boots for minimal flapping and stone ingress. Drawcords and velcro tab adjustment can both work fine. Zip-out stone gaiters are a fave with some US brands.

Vents are great for extending the temperature range of mountain pants. More features add weight and complexity.

A few years back, everyone simply wore Ronhill Tracksters with overtrousers when things got messy. Fortunately things have moved on both aesthetically and functionally.

Stretchy tracksuits Tracksters and similar are still out there, they're simple and good for mobility but have very limited wind and water resistance or thermal value and tend to bag badly when wet. A better cold weather alternative is Powerstretch fleece, but for most things, there are better options.

Microfibres Classic trekking pants generally made from a Nylon or similar microfibre, or perhaps polycotton are great in fine weather. The close weave ups wind resistance, they breathe acceptably and can be hardwearing. Water resistance isn't great however and many are cut in a disconcerting 'dad pants' manner.

Stretch Softshell Schoeller-type stretch softshell fabrics make brilliant all-round mountain pants. Built-in stretch tends to give good mobility and the closely woven fabric gives good weather protection, but without spoililng breathability. With a decent DWR they'll also shrug off anything short of really heavy rain.

Windproof Softshell If you want total windproofing and even more water resistance, fabrics like Windstopper softshell and eVent windproof are close to be watertight and should mean you can live happily without overtrousers virtually all year round - thought the seams will leak eventually. The downside is reduced breathability. PowerShield is a good compromise offering 98 per-cent windproofing but with better breathability than the 100 per-cent windproof fabrics. Vents make a lot of sense with trousers made from these fabrics.

Softshell fabrics have revolutionised legwear. More protection tends to mean reduced breathability.

Pants, or trousers, call them what you want, but the good news is that there's now far more choice than ever before. For all-year, all-round use for an averagely hot sort of mountain walker and scrambler, we like Schoeller-type fabrics.

The stretch allows a closer cut without compromising mobility, they offer good weather protection, which means you rarely need overtrousers, but still breathe really well, so you tend not to overheat.

Choose cut and features carefully and your legwear dilemmas could be over, just fit and forget until the end of the day.

At last, breathability, cut and protection in one. More expensive than the good old Trackster days...

This article should have given you some basic pointers. The good news is that there's a load more advice on OUTDOORSmagic:

Ask on the gear forum about general issues or specific items.

Check the member reviews section for user experiences of kit.

See OM editorial reviews on the front of the site for our impressions.

Ask Richard Gear if you have a specific question you need answering.