Snowshoe & Winterized

Snowshoes are built to help the wearer walk over heavily banked snow. They are built to cover a lot of surface area so that the wearer does not slip down into the snow. The persons weight is distributed evenly over the entire shoe and thus over the surface area of the snow. Traditionally, snowshoes were made out of wood and have leather lacings. As time has gone on and new materials have been created, manufacturers started to make their snowshoes out of metal, which can be lighter weight and does not interact with the snow in the same negative way as wood.

Snowshoeing has been around for a very long time. It can be traced back to Asia over six thousand years ago. It was a practice traditionally believed to be begun by the Inuits and Native Americans. When they migrated to North America, they brought the snowshoes with them, and likely utilized them during the move. The early snowshoes may have been nothing more complicated than slabs of wood affixed to the feet of the walker.

As a shoes, snowshoes still remain largely functional in nature. Most people who use snowshoes do so for work or because their environment requires it for survival. They were created and...