SIMMS Flats Sneaker



SIMMS Flats Sneaker

I've been blessed to go to a number of warm weather destinations to chase fish including The Keys, Christmas Island, Australia, La Paz, and Ascension Bay. Packing for these trips is always such a joy because I can leave behind waders, wool hat, winter gloves, wading boots. All you need to pack is sun block, chapstick, sunglasses, hat and only a couple of shorts and shirts. With all that room, I can be the biggest pack rat with gear, especially flies. My most frequent destination has been Punta Allen in Ascension bay, and I look forward to getting there, taking my shoes off, and not putting them back on till we head home. There are advantages to going bare foot with salt water flats fishing including knowing if you are standing on your fly line while making a cast. But I have had to find out the hard way that walking around barefoot takes its toll. Even with walking on a perfect sandy bottom, the sand will shave off your top layer of skin and make you feel like you have the worst sunburn on the soles of your feet. Not to mention you'll be stepping on hooks, coral, biting crustaceans, and rays. So, I always make room for a pair of flats shoes.

I’ve tried a few different variations but nothing compares to the Simms Flats Sneaker. I tried using a pair of "water sandals" but they tend to get stuck in muckier bottoms and pull off; furthermore, all sizes of sand and gravel end up under your feet. A few other manufacturers make a salt water wading boot, but they are uniformly big and heavy and come up way too high on my calf feeling (for all intents and purposes) like a wading boot- which takes away my joy of going lightweight. This shoe is the perfect combination of lightweight but good protection and they grip on any type of boat deck so you don't end up impaled by the gunwale - not that this has ever happened to me. Like anything made by Simms, these are built to last. Combine these with a Simms Wet Wading Sock or a Neoprene Wading Sock and you have the perfect combination for a long day of flats fishing. You won't be distracted by your lacerated bleeding foot that is busy attracting predators while a black sickle is flipping you the fin around a mangrove shoot. Again, not that has ever happened to me…

Wading Boots

-Charlie Chambers