I might have mentioned this once or twice before: I love the outdoors. I love walking, hiking, trekking, scrambling, whatever you want to call it, so imagine my delight when Trespass – UK outdoor wear brand extraordinaire – wrote to us to say that they’d like us to test out some of their products!

The boots on the left are my trusty old walking boots looking a little sad. I must have walked at least a couple of thousand miles in these old things, but they’ve served me very well for a fair few years and are super-comfy, but when Trespass sent me a brand new pair of Trespass Yukon Womens Walking Boots to try out (right), I was only too happy to oblige.

Trespass’ website says that the Yukon boots have been “created with tough terrain in mind” with a Phylon midsole to keep your feet cosy and a rubber sole designed to enable good balance on unsteady surfaces, so a casual jaunt down the road wasn’t going to cut mustard to let me see what these boots can really do.

As I mentioned in my video postcard the other day, I have recently moved to Cornwall for a few months, so with a couple of new friends in tow (Jack, who knows the area well and acted as our guide, and Billy, chief photographer and song-singer) I decided to kill two birds with one stone and explore the local coastline whilst putting the new boots to the test.

Having checked the times for low tide we planned a route along the shoreline that took in sandy beaches, slippery rocks, muddy pathways, grassy fields and roads. These boots were going to be put through their paces, no two ways about it.

As we made our way over the beach I was struck by the fact that there wasn’t masses of sand creeping its way into my socks; the way the boots tongue is sewn in created a good seal beneath the laces, boding well for the water that was to come a little later.

As the tide was well out, we walked over the rocks between two of the beaches. The boots held up well to the slippery surface created by the seaweed, which is lucky because falling at this point would have meant getting rather wet. Having said that though, I did at one point completely miss my footing through sheer lack of concentration and end up ankle deep in a rock pool – I’m sure the resident fish were less than amused, my feet however remained dry – huzzah!

On reaching our beachy destination (costumes optional. Cheeky.), we joined the footpath. Cornwall has had something of an Indian summer over the past few weeks, so the path was fairly dry but there were a few muddy patches. The lads told me in no uncertain terms that I was to trudge through the muck “for the good of the review”. To my relief, and their disappointment, there was no slipping and falling on my backside…

After a couple of hours walking, I really couldn’t fault the boots on performance. I had broken them in a little beforehand by wearing them on short walks to the shops and that, but I was delighted that there was no sign of rubbing of blisters after this longer walk despite only wearing a pair of thin socks (far too hot for proper hiking socks!).

The only drawback (and I’m not sure it really counts) is the aesthetic. I’m not sure that purist leather-lovers will go for the rather artificial look of the Action Leather upper – it’s a slightly odd colour, with a plasticy finish – but frankly, they’re warm, comfortable and waterproof and I intend to get them so muddy that they’ll be barely recognisable anyway, so who really cares what they look like?

The Yukon boot retails at £99.99, but are currently on sale at £37.99, and are part of a large range of boots on the Trespass website with a variety of styles and price tags. If you are looking for sturdy and good value for money Trespass are a good bet if the Yukon boots are anything to go by.