Snowshoeing

[Grog]

I just snowshoe'ed my way to a store I had to visit about 2 km from home. What an adventure! This snow is nonsense.

Sorry, no photo. There is so much snow falling that I don't think we could have seen anything on the pic anyway!

[bambu101]

I used my new Crescent Moon snowshoes on Tuesday for the first time. It was great fun, and a really tough workout. I always thought cross-country skiing was good exercise, but I think snowshoeing is harder because you don't get to glide like you do while skiing. I used poles since I was in deep snow and rough trails, and that helped with balance.

Lots of tree damage from the big ice storm a couple of weeks ago, but it was great to get out in the woods.

[Jolt]

Finally got out snowshoeing (first time this season) this morning at the local wildlife sanctuary. Unfortunately most of the trails had already been broken so it wasn't quite the challenge I was hoping for but was still a nice hour of exercise and felt good to get outside. It was pretty cold (mid teens) but I was comfortable in all my layers. Didn't see anyone else crazy enough to be out there though. I noticed it seems to work the hip/buttock muscles quite a bit which should be a good thing for me given my recent bout of IT band syndrome. Maybe I'll go again tomorrow or Saturday.

[Drtgirl]

Almost 2' of fresh powder...what a great workout!

[Di bear]

I started the year off right with a snowshoe journey. I also took a little walk, yesterday, and got some awesome pictures along Lake Superior.

[Drtgirl]

Awesome photos DiBear! I can't believe I grew up in Michigan and only made it to the UP once.

[Di bear]

Thanks, Drtgirl!

Life circumstances brought me here, and I am very grateful. I live in Heaven. It's truly amazing how little most Michiganders know about the Upper Peninsula, but we're not complaining.

[beccaB]

I live in the southern part of the mitten, but a lot of high school kids around here end up attending Northern Michigan university. I've been to the southern part of the UP. I would like to camp in the northwestern corner of the UP this coming summer, as long as gas prices stay down. It really is a long way from here. My dream vacation would be to leave from here and go north, and the take highway 2 all the way to Montana. That would add at least a day's travel time to a western vacation I'm hoping to do someday. We have been to some of the state parks along highway 2, and even that is more desolate than anything I've ever seen!

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

What wonderful photos from everyone! Such beautiful places.

Over here we just have to wait for another 6" snowfall or so before I can do any more shoeing. With only a few inches left on the ground now and pretty well trampled down, it's back to fitness walking for now.

[DebW]

Just gave my 5 year old "nephew" his first pair of snowshoes, the MSR Denali Tykers. The two of us went snowshoeing in his back yard. There was only 2" of snow, so snowshoes weren't necessary, but they were usable. Probably good conditions for his first time. We had running races. His 2 year old brother said that I ran slowly.

[3for3]

Hi everyone!

Well, after Christmas, we are all geared up to play in our new home - the land of the ice and snow.....UTAH. I got some snowshoes for my hubby (MSR's) for Christmas, and my sister gave me REI gift money for Christmas to put towards snowshoes. YAY! Anyhow, just got mine yesterday....Went with the Tubbs Sojourn (Yeah, the MSR's are WAY nice, but I just felt there was no way I needed to spend more than twice the money.) I had been reading this thread a little bit and I was concerned about crampon quality, but we won't be doing any hardcore back-country stuff. And thankfully there was a guy there who really seemed to know what he was talking about and said that if we're planning on doing 3-5 days of snowshoeing a week then it's worth the extra money, but otherwise these would serve me well. SO....I hope I made the right choice. Next weekend we are going to try our hand at it. We will have company in from out of town who have never snowshoed either. Our choices of terrain are: groomed trails at the Olympic cross-country skiing venue (which we would have to pay for. We hear there nice, but PAYING just to WALK somewhere? We're not sure about that), romping around the hills around our house that are mostly snowed over mountain bike trails, or heading into American Fork Canyon for some hiking trials (which would be ungroomed, but we've hiked some of those in the summer so we know the area a little.) There's a fair amount of elevation increase on those. My husband will have our three year old daughter in the hiking backpack. I made sure I got the snowshoes with really good crampons and traction for him to avoid worrying about slippage. Advice on where to start for first timers? And do you typically wear your snowpants when snowshoeing? I will be wearing my Merrell Winterlude 6 boots, but do not have gators yet. Would snow pants help a little more with keeping dry or will they be too hot? Hope these aren't silly questions. Thanks for any tips!

[shootingstar]

Since you have a child, it makes sense to go on flatter terrain..certainly any trail amongst snow-draped trees would be a magic like thing for a child (and it still is for this adult ). Also you would be protected from alot of wind whipping around vs. a huge open flat field.

I don't wear snowpants when we've snowshoed in the mountains here in British Columbia. I just wear water repellant pants that I use for cycling over long underwear and tights. But gaiters are very helpful to keep you dry when kicking up the snow from the upswing of snowshoes at the back of your feet as you walk..in particularily powdery deep snow. I've noticed being a shorter person in deep snow, for some reason, the snow just swings higher behind me... For adult, if you know how you would dress for xcountry skiing, that would be an helpful guide plus gaiters for snowshoeing could be useful starting point.

Sounds like any child at that age would benefit from at least snowpants...wouldn't want to stop him from making a snow angel lying down in the snow, before/after snowshoeing.

This would be in temperatures that we've done at 10 degrees F below freezing as the lowest we've done, in the coastal and interior mountains here.

We have snowshoed in some quieter areas...going into Revelstoke National Park in the Rockies...is ...very quiet...hardly anyone there between Christmas and New Years. So one should have some warm layers if something should happen..which can in mountain areas with sudden weather changes and one is out for a 15 kms. snowshoeing up the mountainsides in that park.

But everyone is different here.

[Crankin]

Went for my second snow shoe of the season today at Flag Hill conservation area in Boxborough/Stow. We weren't the first out on the trail, because there were ski tracks, but definitely the second. There was about 5-6 inches of powder that felt a lot deeper for some reason. We had a surprise at the beginning; a new trail was cut that went up the side of the hill at the beginning and then met back with the original trail about 1/2 of a mile up. So a good warm up because after just a little bit of flat then you start up the hill, which is about a 350 foot climb in about a mile or less before you loop around and come back down. I love snow shoeing in fresh snow! When we got to the bottom of the hill, we continued just a bit on the flat trail and then turned around. My guess is we did about 3 miles, maybe a little bit more. We were out for about an hour. Did see the x country skier who made the tracks; she was flying on terrain that is definitely not groomed...
Then we headed for the coffee place to have mocha lattes.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Hi Robyn!
We went snowshoeing today too!
DH got to use his new snowshoes for the very first time, and the first time we've ever gone shoeing together. We went on a snowshoe hike with a small group from the Land Conservancy here, on protected land. There may be photos up later this week from them, but I did take a couple of cute pix this morning in our backyard while DH was trying out the shoes.
The second picture was when he pretended to be Frankenstein.

[Crankin]

Excellent pictures, Lisa! I didn't take any yesterday. On the way home from the coffee place, my tooth started hurting. It went away, but now it's feeling weird again. I am going to try and ignore this, since I am going to get my butt out of the door and go x country skiing this morning. I have an appointment for a cleaning later this week anyway, so it will wait until then.
The weather looks brutal for the rest of the week. A high of 10 F on Friday , the night I have to go into Boston for theatre.