Walking on (Frozen) Water: A Primer on Snowshoeing

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Walking on (Frozen) Water: A Primer on
Snowshoeing
by Darren Bush on November 13, 2012 · 4 comments
in Travel, Travel & Leisure
This post is brought to
you by State Farm.
What’s this?
Once upon a time in Central Asia,
some prehistoric inventor
watched his friends trudge
through deep snow in hot pursuit
of a tasty mammoth. A snowshoe
hare went bounding by and the
prehistoric equivalent of a light
bulb went off.
Homo ingenius slapped a few
pieces of wood on the snow and
tied them on his
feet. Rudiment ary, but he got to
the mammot h first and got to
keep the tusks.
For thousands of years, native
people from the North Country
have been using snowshoes as
four-wheel drive for their feet.
Without t hem they would have
been immobile for the winter,
which means freezing or starving.
For these people,

snowshoes were critical to
survival. Contrary to
popular belief Eskimos
didn’t use snowshoes, as
they mostly walked on ice.
It was further south where
deep snow made travel
impossible
without flotation.
The effectiveness of snowshoes wasn’t lost on the military. When a battle was fought in snow,
the better snowshoe won. A few decisive victories were won by the British during the French and
Indian Wars due to their superior snowshoes. The famous Tenth Mount ain Division was issued
both skis and snowshoes as they trained on the slopes of Mount Rainier. Their valor in World War
II was well document ed and their ef f ectiveness as a fighting force was enhanced by their ability to
go where others couldn’t. As I build and repair traditional shoes, I’ve become a bit of a magnet for
people who find an old pair of snowshoes in their father’s or grandfather’s garage. More often
than not, they’re Army issue from t he 10
th
Mountain Division.
Voyageurs and trappers learned quickly from the indigenous people the benefits of traveling by
snowshoe. Even today many trappers still travel this way, using smaller, more maneuverable shoes
for working their trap lines. In Scandinavia some postmen even still deliver the mail by snowshoe.
Their utility has not diminished with time.
Snowshoe Construction 101
Snowshoes are a simple concept. Weight distributed over a larger area doesn’t sink as much into
the snow. I weigh about 200 pounds. My feet are size 10.5. According to my back-of-envelope
calculations, one of my hiking boots has about 50 square inches of floatation, or about four
pounds per square inch. My traditional laced snowshoe is 12×60, and after a little calculus to
calculate the area under the curve, my snowshoes have about 450 square inches of floatation,
less than half a pound per square inch. All things being equal, where I might sink to my knees in my

boots, I would sink only to my ankles as the snowshoes compress the snow. Below I am walking in
18 inches of snow.
Traditional Snowshoes
Traditional shoes have been made the same way for centuries. The traditional wood for
snowshoe frames has always been ash, due t o its durability to weight ratio and its relative ease of
shaping. Ash staves are split out of a log and worked down to size with a drawknife or crooked
shaping. Ash staves are split out of a log and worked down to size with a drawknife or crooked
knife. These staves are never sawed as it’s important to follow the grain so that when the frame is
bent it doesn’t crack. After the staves are shaped, the wood is steamed to soften the lignin, which
acts as a glue holding together the wood fibers. Steam it too much and you can cook out the
lignin; steam it too little and it won’t bend. It takes a practiced hand and a few ruined frames to
learn how to do it.
Here’s a chair created by some design students in t he UK. Yes, it is wood. Amazing.
Once the wood is soft and
flexible, it’s time to clamp it
onto a form. The form is just
a frame shaped to create
your snowshoe in the style
you want, with lots of places
to clamp the wood in
place. This must be done
quickly (you have about a
minute) or the lignin starts to
harden and you may have to
re-steam or toss your
stave. Let the wood rest on
the form for an hour or so
and you have a snowshoe
frame.
Lacing Your Frames

The traditional material for lacing is leather cut into t hin strips called babiche. It’s a species of
rawhide that softens when soaked in water and hardens as it dries. It can be thick or thin, but
whatever it is, lacing with it is like weaving linguini. It takes a practiced hand to weave with babiche.
The patterns can be quite open with thick lacing, or very fine with thin, almost string-like lacing.
The tighter the weave, the better the flotation, so for powdery snow a tighter weave is
best. Some of the patterns woven by my two favorite shoe builders, t he Attimatek and Eastern
Cree, are works of art . Function and beauty go together perfectly.
A nice combination of modern and ancient is to use wood frames but a modern material for the
lacing. I have used sliced neoprene and flat nylon webbing for lacing shoes, and they both work
very well, are more durable, and can be more forgiving. Babiche needs to be kept varnished or it will
soften on contact with moisture, and to keep it from wearing out.
Generally the foot bed is laced last. This is the area right underneath your foot and is made with
thicker and more durable lacing material, whatever it might be. The tips and tails are usually a finer
thicker and more durable lacing material, whatever it might be. The tips and tails are usually a finer
size and have a tighter weave. The pattern is fairly simple and anyone can do it with a little
practice.
Whether it be nylon or babiche, the shoes
need to be varnished to waterproof both the
frames and the lacing. A good spar varnish
(from a marina store, not Generic Home
Center) is critical as it is more flexible and lasts
longer. Just slather it on and keep going until it
doesn’t absorb any more.
Bindings
Bindings att ach your feet to your shoes,
allowing the heel to lift while keeping the ball
of your foot right over the pivot
point. Bindings range from a simple piece of
lamp wick to a formed leather or neoprene
harness that hugs your foot. The tails drag,

providing a ruddering effect, keeping t he
shoes facing forward. This binding is a full-
grain leather work binding which fastens to
the footbed. I like leather because it’s durable
and snow doesn’t stick to it, plus it doesn’t
get stif f in the cold.
The purpose of this article is not to teach you
how to build a pair of shoes but to make you
aware of the basics, so you can understand
your equipment better and maybe be inspired to
make your own. Resources for learning how to
build are listed below.
Modern Changes
Modern shoes are a far cry f rom the wood and leather hand-built snowshoes of the last half
dozen millennia. Frames of aluminum and even tit anium became the order of the day, with decks
made of neoprene or other similar materials. Modern snowshoes come with injection-molded toe
pieces and built-in crampons, which are claw-like teeth that grab the snow with a serious bite.
Bindings are more sophisticated too. The shoes on the left in the photo above are moderns from
Crescent Moon, and you can see a red plastic binding with two black st raps across the top of the
boot. The modern bindings really snug down around the foot right over the crampon. They are
more complex, and that has advantages and disadvantages. The advantage is adjust ability; the
disadvantage is that more complex means more things that can break.
But in general t he upside of the modern shoe is that they require less maintenance than traditional
ones. Metal frames and plastic decks and bindings don’t wear out if used properly. There are other
advantages as well. The crampons are excellent for snow conditions where there is a lot of cycling
between freezing and thawing, making a surface crust that is slippery for traditional shoes.
Because they are smaller and narrower, some people find that their stride is more natural. Models
made specifically for running in the snow are available too; they’re as small and light as possible,
which means less floatation than a wide shoe, but more mobility.
The downsides? Aesthetics, for one. No one hangs a pair of modern shoes over the fireplace.

They can be squeaky in certain conditions, and without the crampons, t he deck material is very
slippery. And as mentioned, modern shoes tend to be smaller, so you sink a little more in light
snow.
I won’t reveal my bias here, as I own bot h kinds and use them both in different conditions. I can say
Snowshoeing makes a great date. You should
probably tell your gal to come wearing pants
though.
that in my area of the world where hills are gent le and snow is generally fluffy and untracked, I use
traditional shoes. When I travel to hilly places out west, out come the moderns.
What About Using Poles?
I love poles. Even with the most stable
snowshoes, poles provide a measure of
balance that makes snowshoeing a lot easier
for novices, and gives you a lit t le boost up hills.
It also adds a little upper body workout and
some serious cardio. I also use them sometimes
as a sort of imprompt u monopod for taking
pictures in lower light.
Speaking of which, snowshoeing continues to
gain popularity with photographers who love
shoot ing in the winter. Cross-country skiing is
great, but if you want to stop and take a
picture, slipping and sliding can make it tough to
frame a shot.
The Zen of the ‘Shoe
In the fast paced world, we need something to
slow us down. Cross-country skiing used to be
a fairly leisurely activity, but the Lycra crowd
came in with skate skiing and turned it into a
very fast-paced sport. Not that there’s anything

wrong with that: a nice long skate feels good,
like a nice long run feels good. But everything
moves faster now.
I’m not sure if the need for slowing down is the reason, but snowshoeing has passed Nordic skiing
in its growt h and shows no signs of slowing down. I find myself carrying a small pack and walking
rather than skiing, checking out the birds, and seeing more than I would if I were focusing on
balance and staying on track.
Strap on your snowshoes, leave the world behind, and enter the quiet stillness
of the woods in winter.
For wint er camping, I prefer snowshoeing while pulling a toboggan with all my gear on it. Weight
and bulk become non-issues with a toboggan, and camping in a canvas tent with a small
woodstove in it is as comf ortable as anyone can expect in the wilderness. When it’s 80 degrees
warmer inside the tent than outside, it’s almost cheating. Almost.
Try it out. You can build, buy, or borrow a pair and get out there. If you live in warmer environs,
drive to some snow. It ’s worth the trip, I promise.
Resources
North House
Folk School
(www.northhouse.org): Teaches snowshoe building classes as well as a number of other
traditional crafts and skills.
Country Ways (www.snowshoe.com). Sells snowshoe kits with pre-bent frames and
complete instructions on lacing and finishing.
Ferdy Goode, an artist, canoe builder and snowshoe maker
( bumps his head and forgets more about
snowshoeing than I’ll ever know. His shoes are in demand worldwide and he also builds and
restores birchbark canoes.
Crescent Moon Snowshoes (). Owner and
Founder Jake is the real deal. His shop is powered by wind and they have a great
environmental story. One of the top modern shoes.
Atlas Snowshoes (). Another great company, one of the first

modern shoe companies.
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