Ibex pants - Mountain Equipment Ibex Mountain Pant - Men's

I've used these pants on a single overnight backpacking trip. These are my initial impressions. In general, I like these pants. The conditions in which I used them included temps between 30* and 50* F, hiking primarily in the snow. I wore them as the only layer on my lower half. The fabric was well suited to fend off light snow that fell at times.

A key thing you should be aware of is the thigh pocket design: because the zippers are vertical, there is the potential for the loss of items if you are negligent closing the zipper properly or if the zipper drops as you're hiking. Unfortunately, I speak from experience. I lost an iPhone that I had in one of the thigh pockets. It fell out within 1 hour of starting my hike. I don't know if I didn't close the zipper properly, or if the zipper slowly lowered from the weight of the phone in the pocket, step after step. I suspect one reason for that particular zipper orientation is that it's the optimal orientation for using the pockets for the purpose of venting. Of course, you can't use them as both pockets and vents at the same time!

Another feature that I'm less than thrilled with is the snaps at the top of the fly. Instead of a single large snap, the pants have two smaller snaps one above the other. When trying to snap the pants with cold hands or gloves on, it's a bit fiddly. One snap would be eaiser. On the plus side, the fly has a two-way zipper, which makes it eaiser to quickly answer the answer the call of nature when wearing a pack hipbelt.

As far as sizing goes, I'm 5' 10", 170#, with a 32" inseam. I tried both the 32" waist and 34" waist, and found that the 34" with regular inseam fit just right.

Overall I like these pants. In the future, I'll be more careful with using the thigh pockets