Gliding snowshoes

[TLM]

OK, tried them for the first time ever. Basically short wide skis (140 cm, 12cm) with non slip fur on part of the glide surface.

Well they work, kind of, they do not glide nearly as well as skis but almost as handy as snow shoes in tight places, poles really required.

In even half way open forest proper skis are way faster and actually easier to control. Going downhill with these is really an experience, slightly scary at times as they slide this way and that way including sideways, no groves on the gliding surface. Getting the tip too deep into the snow is very easy. Then again I don't doubt that some control can be learned after a while.

I have kind of mixed feelings, they do work but are they really useful or just a gimmick. A solution waiting for a problem?

I don't know, maybe I have to make a second test run next winter.

 

[Robson Valley]

Sounds too tricky for me. I prefer the traditional designs that we have here such as the Bear Paws. For years, I worked on "trail breakers", 60" long and you drag the heels, only lifting the pointed toes. They are so slim, one footprint fits against the previous one so your crotch doesn't ache after a quarter mile.
They are sinew, needing varnish every spring. OK by me.

For more personal use, I have a rebuilt/salvaged pair of Sherpa with ice claws on the undersides of the insteps. They feel good on a wind-packed slope. Industrial Reproductions in the city of Prince George, BC may have the license to build them. They certainly have all the parts for repairs.

Be careful. One dead and 3 badly injured in the latest avalanche in western BC. Bunch of Heli skiers. Total for this winter is 13 now, nothing to brag about. A weak layer has persisted all damn winter at various depths.

 

[TLM]

Be careful. One dead and 3 badly injured in the latest avalanche in western BC.

No avalanches in southern Finland no uncovered hills and no mountains. Very different in Lapland where there is some prime avalanche country.

 

[SaraR]

Do you have a picture of them?

 

[Kav]

It’s interesting. Snowshoes were an exclusive Northern Turtle Island invention and the ski evolved in Eurasia. One archaeologist decided otherwise. The fragments of Oetzi’s rucksack lacing holes measure the same as traditional snowshoes ERGO! Because a pack won’t fit under the reed cape She discovered they were snowshoes.
NOT. The reed capes were rectangular .
I too, like my Canadian neighbor have a pair of ‘ Ojibwa’ pattern ash and rawhide shoes, bear paws and lamp wicking bindings. Not much use in SoCalifornia. But with climate change a distant descendant may thank me breaking trail on Mulholland drive.
Added bonus: You look like SGT Preston of the Yukon

 

[TLM]

There is some evidence that snowshoes were known but skis much preferred. GS has some resemblance with the Sibirian version of skis that were/are short and wide and were apparently sometimes used without poles.

 

[TLM]

A pic here.

 

[Kav]

If you want inspiration- or be dissuaded ; read about SNOWSHOE THOMPSON here in California. I briefly packed mules.
We had a overnight snowfall. Mules have smaller hooves than horses and never used in boggy or snowy places IE Alaska.
The senior skinner reached into this steamer trunk and proceeded to buckle on old army snowshoes for mules!
They looked like me at my first dance for half an hour and then were fine.