Snowshoeing

[Miranda]

Unless you are over 180 pounds, get the 25" or 26" shoes- they are PLENTY long enough. The bigger ones are good for heavy people or big tall men, but they are harder to manuever and turn in because of their big size.
...Hope this is helpful...

Thx BSG for answering that! It was very helpful. My only pondering thought now is what size to order. Weight wise, on the skinnest days I'm between 115-120#. Recently more like 120-125# and holding. Last winter, I was approaching the 130# mark, but went back down to stay in the 120#s (5'5" tall, btw). I will weight myself with the boots I have now, and clothing layers, but I think I would still be in the smaller shoe range for Tubbs chart of 80-150#.

HOWEVER, the next size, what you have, is 120-200#s. Those would work too obviously. But, I wondered which would be the lesser of the evils: 1) longer shoe = harder to move in, but better snow float; or 2) shorter shoe = less to move around, but I might sink in the snow more.

[Crankin]

I was actually happy to see this thread! Not that the cycling season is over, but it's getting there...
I would get the shorter snow shoes, if I was on the edge between 2 sizes. But that's only because i would trip over my feet on the longer ones.

[MrsB]

Oh Im not ready for winter in Maine. There saying that we are suposed to have an extremely cold and snowy winter. I really love it until about February and then Im ready for some warm days. Guess I should start digging out all the winter stuff soon. When I bought my snowshoes a few years back I bought the shortest for my height/weight and ended up buying another longer pair for deeper snow. Last year I had my eye on those MSR Lightning snowshoes from LL bean. DH gave me a nice gift card to LL Bean but they were all sold out by the time I got there so I ended up with new X-country skis which was ok cuz I take the dogs out and they pull me along. Looking forward to hearing about everyones winter expeditions.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Thx BSG for answering that! It was very helpful. My only pondering thought now is what size to order. Weight wise, on the skinnest days I'm between 115-120#. Recently more like 120-125# and holding. Last winter, I was approaching the 130# mark, but went back down to stay in the 120#s (5'5" tall, btw). I will weight myself with the boots I have now, and clothing layers, but I think I would still be in the smaller shoe range for Tubbs chart of 80-150#.

HOWEVER, the next size, what you have, is 120-200#s. Those would work too obviously. But, I wondered which would be the lesser of the evils: 1) longer shoe = harder to move in, but better snow float; or 2) shorter shoe = less to move around, but I might sink in the snow more.

If you were much shorter than me, I'd say get the smaller shoes since your legs would be shorter too. But you and I are the same height (Crankin is several inches shorter), and for that reason I'd say get the same size I have....25". I find they are perfect size (not too giant, not too small), and it's surprising how even with snowshoes on you will sink several inches into fresh snow before they 'take'. Sinking in more makes it harder to walk (which is why it's so much easier to walk on someone's previous footsteps rather than breaking a fresh trail).
If you get smaller ones you will sink into the snow further. You'll be glad for that bit of extra flotation I think, and your legs are long enough to be able to stride and turn nicely in the 25"'ers- my humble opinion.

[Miranda]

Thx ladies to those of you that posted about to my questions about sizing. I'm 5'5" tall, but long torsed and short legs. Probably a 29" inseam. I'm forever in heels in pants as my torso is too long for the petite size hips-to-crotch, but my legs are too short for the regular pants. My mom needed to grow my legs 2-3" longer in the womb with the rest of me.

There are some hilly trails (not CO mts/hills, midwest=flat, except going into MI, then more incline) I can do that would probably be groomed at parks. So the crampons would be used to not slide down. Most places to just "go out the front door" to shoe w/o further travel would be ungroomed deeper powder. Nature preserves, parks, corn fields (we have a lot of those in the midwest). It sounds like the larger shoe w/more float would be best for the powder.

OK, on buyer's remorse, here's what happened with my xc ski purchase. I ended up getting traditional nordic for groomed trails. I never really made it to the groomed trails. Everytime we had a nice snow, I had time to go out to the powder deeper drifted places like I mentioned above. DH would just crack up laughing, "omg, M! you are going to try and ski in 'that' with your trail ski?! wahaha...".

So, I could have really benefitted from buying skis more geared towards backcountry use. This year I have found where some groomed trails are suppose to be due to mtb there, and will take my nordics out more. But, I kinda wish I had the more agressive pair. Suppose it's like bikes... different things suited for different purposes. I would think the Tubbs Wilderness ss is somewhat like riding a cyclecross bike... it does a little bit of everything.

[Crankin]

Well, my opinion was just based on my observation, not technical knowledge. I have a pretty hard time stomping through powder with my short legs, but I look at it as a good work out. We don't get that much fresh powder here...
I know what you mean about the skis. I bought new ones 3 years ago. I told the guy I wanted the newer, shorter ones. My first pair were bought in 1991 and were really basic. Well, both my husband and I ended up getting ones that are probably the longest new x country skis around! We really had nothing to compare them to, until our friends got new ones. I thought REI would be honest, but I guess we just didn't know enough, as opposed to when we buy bike stuff. I just don't ski enough to get another pair so soon. Some of this is weather related, of course, since the amount of snow we get is extremely variable. My husband really doesn't like skiing that much and I think the skis have something to do with it.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Miranda-
By the way you can see a picture of me here, (I'm 5' 5" and 140 lbs) wearing my 25" Tubbs Wilderness shoes:
Tubbs25"

I think you can clearly see there that the shoes are not too big for me. Hope that helps....

[Miranda]

Miranda-
By the way you can see a picture of me here, (I'm 5' 5" and 140 lbs) wearing my 25" Tubbs Wilderness shoes:
Tubbs25"

I think you can clearly see there that the shoes are not too big for me. Hope that helps....

Thx BSG! That's a great pic of you... looks like your ss are a blast. The angle you are holding your foot up in the pic helps. I was wondering where the length went on the shoe. Meaning... like did your foot go in the center, towards the back, etc. Crankin's point was sticking in my head on that one. I thought... if the majority of the shoe length is in the front, then with my short legs for my height, it just might be enough to trip me up in eternal ss selection misery. With the length being towards the back it just might give me the extra float. I tried to pile on the stuff I might be wearing to ss and re-weighed myself. I was in the mid 130-ish. I know this doesn't sound very epic , but one of the main reasons I want the ss for is my dog. My yellow lab I had to get put down this summer, but I have a new black one. I loved hiking with my dog. And labs love to run and play outside with their people. I just want to be able to take my doggie out to our woodsy park trails, desolete winter midwest corn fields etc., to play and take in winter beauty. A humble goal... but mine it is. I appreciate your help in the process.

[Crankin]

I went snow shoeing today! Nothing special; went out on the neighborhood trail in a foot of fresh powder. No one else had been on the trail and it was great. Just before it intersects with another trail, we saw some skiers and we decided to try a newly cut trail. It traversed up the hill, until meeting another trail that ends up almost across the street from our house! We didn't go far, but I would say we did about 250 feet (at least) of climbing in maybe two miles. I had climbed up the other trail that goes straight up the hill last winter and I would say that it's at least a 25% grade. What we did today is not quite as steep, but it was pretty challenging. What's really cool is that you feel like you are in the middle of nowhere and you're right across the street from my house.

[Miranda]

Well, my opinion was just based on my observation, not technical knowledge. I have a pretty hard time stomping through powder with my short legs, but I look at it as a good work out. We don't get that much fresh powder here...
I know what you mean about the skis. I bought new ones 3 years ago. I told the guy I wanted the newer, shorter ones. My first pair were bought in 1991 and were really basic. Well, both my husband and I ended up getting ones that are probably the longest new x country skis around! We really had nothing to compare them to, until our friends got new ones. I thought REI would be honest, but I guess we just didn't know enough, as opposed to when we buy bike stuff. I just don't ski enough to get another pair so soon. Some of this is weather related, of course, since the amount of snow we get is extremely variable. My husband really doesn't like skiing that much and I think the skis have something to do with it.

Crankin... I can not tell you what a tainted shopper I have become with some of my shop experiences (bikes, ski, etc.). One rep says one thing, next person something else, another visit back to rep #1 has a diff story... BLEAH!!! I spend a lot of time "geeking-it-out" here on 'da interwebz because I just don't trust the real life help. How sad is that? I have some more blab about skis I'm going to do in one of those threads, but I feel your pain about the sizing. The only way I ended up with what I'm pretty sure is the right size for me from my live shop was with the help of my TE cyber pals. The type of ski I bought, nordic vs bc, was more a use forecasting mishap on my part. The Midwest doesn't get snow like CO. Thus gear use is hit or miss... so, a gal really doesn't want her purchase to be the wrong thing PLUS used intermittently. FWIW, my Mayberry shop does take some trade ins for used stuff re-sale... maybe your DH could trade in his skis for something else? It does make it really hard to determine if you like the activitiy when you are sorting out if it's the gear that sux... or the sport itself.

EDIT: One other fleeting thought... I wonder if a cheaper route would be to just get a shorter ski and mount the bindings you already own on it? That way you don't have to invest in a whole new outfit of gear, just part of it. But, I don't really know much about ski stuff. I do know for sure that we have TE girls here on the board that have that experience.