Aiming High - Practicing in Heels

[higherheels]

They certainly are!

Normally real world walking is the only way for me (except while breaking in a new pair), but since the Hot Chicks are such a challenge it was good to do more indoors.

My biggest obstacle for wearing them out is that they don't feel suitable for many things. I don't have that many occasions with limited walking distance, and can't yet overcome myself to wear them for basic things like grocery shopping. Also this would bring the issue of driving in them, which I don't feel safe to do so. Typical luxury problems of living with Hot Chicks 😀

[Shyheels]

Yes I guess that is very much a First World problem - the potential troubles with driving in towering Louboutin stilettos! Not a problem shared by much of the world.  I can see too where the 13cm heels on Hot Chicks might not be suitable for a lot of situations. And a bit of overkill for grocery shopping!

In a way our challenges are quite similar. There is nowhere within easy walking distance for me to wear my 12cm heels or indeed any stilettos. Simply getting off the boat in them would be impossible. I’m moored along a little jetty which is essentially a long fibreglass grate. A stiletto heel would simply go through one of the holes before you took a single step. And then there is the muddy chalky towpath for a kilometre before a very steep farm road up into town. So I have to put my stilettos in a backpack and change into them. I can do that in the park and practice there, but wearing 12cm stilettos in a small farm town grocery store seems overkill, Otherwise it’s a matter of catching a bus to a bigger town. And so the obstacles to real world practice start to build up.

[Cali]

I can drive in my high stiletto heels, but it recks the outside of the heel. And it has put a hole in my rubber floor mat. So now I will take the right heel off while driving.

[Shyheels]

I think maybe I'm starting to get somewhere with my practicing, even if it is just indoors. I put on my heels this morning and felt really quite grounded, on solid footing. Its really nice!

[mlroseplant]

46 minutes ago, Shyheels said:

I think maybe I'm starting to get somewhere with my practicing, even if it is just indoors. I put on my heels this morning and felt really quite grounded, on solid footing. Its really nice!

That is a very nice feeling, indeed! Unfortunately, I don't have that feeling nearly enough. It's not that I feel clumsy or uncomfortable, but rarely do I feel like I actually know what I'm doing. I may expand upon that thought later.

22 hours ago, CrushedVamp said:

Do members on here feel as if watching "how to walk in high heels' videos on Youtube helps?

The reason I ask is, my wife will people-watch people at weddings and confide in me that this person or that does not know how to walk in high heels. It is not done in a nefarious way, just making a point.

I have watched a few videos on youtube and they have stated what my wife has made comments about over the years like taking shorter steps, stepping with toe or heel down first when walking on certain surfaces, etc. So I know they and she seem to be lockstep on their pointers, if you will forgive the bad pun?

I will have to buck the trend here, and say that I do not find How to Walk in Heels videos to be very helpful at all. There are a significant portion of them that are just wrong, or give bad advice. Those that do give correct advice present it in such a way to be less than helpful with the motion of the walk, if that makes any sense. And whoever says you need to walk upon a straight line, or worse yet, cross your feet over each other as you take each step needs to be publicly shamed. Nobody walks that way on the street. It looks beyond absurd. I'm not saying that there aren't any good videos out there, but they are few.

[higherheels]

Yesterday evening it buggered my mind so much that I can't find good everyday occasions for the Hot Chicks, that I just put them on and went for a walk around the block.

Actually this might be the best training occasion anyway, because it's simple, I can always do it, and I can vary the length. And my neighbours know me anyway so they probably won't even realize if I'm wearing 13 cm heels instead of 11 cm 😅

 

6 hours ago, Cali said:

I can drive in my high stiletto heels, but it recks the outside of the heel.

Usually I also always drive in my heels, but somehow I never tried in the higher ones. And I have the same issue with scuffed heels from driving, so I wouldn't want to do this to my Hot Chicks.

 

1 hour ago, Shyheels said:

I put on my heels this morning and felt really quite grounded, on solid footing. Its really nice!

That sounds very good 🙂

 

41 minutes ago, mlroseplant said:

And whoever says you need to walk upon a straight line, or worse yet, cross your feet over each other as you take each step needs to be publicly shamed.

Exactly! Nobody walks like that, and I don't see any sense in that. Maybe it's a thing of the look coming from the runway...

[Shyheels]

@mlroseplant and @higherheels - Thank you for your presence and encouragement! I’m really quite chuffed. I really feel quite at ease. To be sure I’m not out striding a high street, on roughened sidewalks, taking curbs and hustling to cross that the lights, but as I walk confidently around indoors I can certainly now imagine doing such a thing and doing it with reasonable grace.

i too find this who catwalk routine ridiculous. It looks exaggerated and absurd on the catwalk. In real life it would be comical. 

[Puffer]

On 10/14/2025 at 4:40 AM, Cali said:

I can drive in my high stiletto heels, but it recks the outside of the heel. And it has put a hole in my rubber floor mat. So now I will take the right heel off while driving.

In a 'proper' car (manual gearbox), we use both feet!   And probably better to replace both stilettos than having a pair of mismatched shoes on to drive.   

[CrushedVamp]

2 minutes ago, Puffer said:

In a 'proper' car (manual gearbox), we use both feet!   And probably better to replace both stilettos than having a pair of mismatched shoes on to drive.   

My wife can drive in heels, but I am not sure that I could.

Here in the United States it is rare now to see a manual transmission car, and even for big trucks, a manual transmission is getting harder to find. I grew up on trucks with two shifters, (Mack's suicide shift) up to 18 gears, and deep reduction and split rear-ends, but now if a company wants to get a truckdriver, since about half cannot drive manual a transmission trucks, they buy automatics so half the truckdriver applicants won't leave for a different company. Many truckdrivers just refuse to drive manual transmission trucks now.

Sad!

[mlroseplant]

I know I'm repeating myself, but now there's a new audience, so it won't seem like it! I can drive in heels, even a real car/truck with a real transmission, but I find no thrill in it. If I have to go more than a few miles, I'll take my shoes off. I just don't enjoy it, though some may find it titillating.

I've said for years that I should make my own how to walk in heels video, but I doubt it will ever happen for several reasons. I do like some elements of the model walk or beauty queen walk, but it needs to be toned down for the street to avoid looking ridiculous. This thing they call the "horse walk," however, is completely unusable, and frankly, looks like an excellent way to break shoes.

[Shyheels]

I’ve never tried driving in heels although I don’t think I’d find it a problem, except perhaps for worrying about damaging the heels. I can drive a manual easily - I learned in them, drive them all my life and indeed most of the cars here are manual. I can also drive a left or right hand drive vehicle, changing back and forth readily as I used to have to do on a regular basis when I travelled a lot 

[Cali]

I only take my right heel off when I have stilettos on and going to drive for over 20 minutes. Otherwise I drive in my heels, even for a 8 - 9 hour trip.  Most car sold in the US have a CVT - continuous variable transmission, which is a belt system.

Edited 23 hours ago by Cali

[higherheels]

9 hours ago, Puffer said:

In a 'proper' car (manual gearbox), we use both feet!

This line could be from my husband, I'm sure he said that before 😅

 

8 hours ago, mlroseplant said:

I can drive in heels, even a real car/truck with a real transmission, but I find no thrill in it.

I also don't find any thrill in it. For me it's a practical thing. If I wouldn't drive in heels I'd have to change shoes everytime I get in and out of the car. For longer trips it might be OK, but not for the everyday drives. Also I can't find any downsides of driving in heels, as long as they're below 10 cm or so. If they're higher, the heel gets a bit in the way when pressing the pedals.

[Shyheels]

I can tell you absolutely that you don't want to pilot a narrowboat in heels! Certainly not stilettos! You could probably get away with it in chunky heeled boots with 7 to 8 cm heels, but I wouldn't fancy it - not as a single-hander, unless you had someone to work the locks.

[CrushedVamp]

My wife can drive in her everyday heels, and by that, I mean the ones that are 3-1/2 inch or so in height. I have seen her do it a few times when going to church or special functions but it is a pretty rare occasion. Most of the time it’s a place we are going together like church, a dinner-date, or some outing and it’s just more common for me to drive. If she does drive in heels, it is because for some reason we had to take two vehicles. I am not sure with her taller heels if she could safely drive, or more to the point, she would FEEL as though she could safely drive. She would probably just take them off.

I do not wear high heels so I am not sure if I could or not. I would test my ability but while I do not have big feet per se, I can’t wear her shoes.

But everything we have for vehicles has automatic transmissions of some kind even the skidders, bulldozer, tractors… yep, everything we have.

[higherheels]

2 hours ago, Shyheels said:

I can tell you absolutely that you don't want to pilot a narrowboat in heels!

I don't know anything about any boats, but I believe you on that 😉

 

1 hour ago, CrushedVamp said:

I am not sure with her taller heels if she could safely drive

I cannot recommend. The highest ones I've driven with must have been a 11 cm heel. I didn't feel unsafe, but uncomfortable. The hardest is pressing the clutch pedal, because you have to stretch your foot more than in lower heels.

If I wear anything higher I'm just letting my husband drive.

[CrushedVamp]

4 minutes ago, higherheels said:

I cannot recommend. The highest ones I've driven with must have been a 11 cm heel. I didn't feel unsafe, but uncomfortable. The hardest is pressing the clutch pedal, because you have to stretch your foot more than in lower heels.

If I wear anything higher I'm just letting my husband drive.

11 CM is still a lot of heel!

We switch who drives quite often, but when she is in heels I just tend to be the one who drives. Not to sound sexist in any way, but on dinner dates and in going to church, I will be chivalrous and go around and get the door for her. I know Prince Philp once said, "When a man opens a car door for his wife, it's either a new car or a new wife." But that does not work so well for me. We dress up because we like how it makes us feel, and making her feel special by opening her car door when she is dressed up is not an afront to me.

I do not have any sons, my only son passed away, but all five of my daughters can curtsey. THAT is something that is VERY rare on this side of the pond, but we have tried to instill a little class in our daughters. Had I had a son, I would do the same... well... maybe not having him give curtseys, but by opening his girlfriend's car door and other chivalrous behavior. :-)

[mlroseplant]

Another thing that is difficult, but not impossible to do in heels is ride a motorbike. It seems exciting at first, but as a practical matter it is somewhat less than exciting, and very possibly rather unsafe. This is one of the reasons I switched to a scooter, with automatic transmission and no foot controls. Those things were made for heels!

[Shyheels]

Yes, go to Rome or any Italian city and you’ll see plenty of elegant high-heeled women zipping about in Vespas