After working a year, you are looking forward to going on a holiday where you can relax and get stronger for the next working year. After years of long summer holidays, you come to the conclusion that it’s not always about summer and the sea, you are starting to think about snow and more snow. Or for example, snowshoeing.
You can book a beautiful hotel in the mountains in Canada, or rent a small wooden house in Switzerland with your friends or family and enjoy the cold breath of nature. But, just staying inside drinking tea and reading a book wouldn’t give you as much enjoyment as walking through the woods while it’s snowing.
Snowshoeing is a great winter activity and exercise, that you can do with your whole family: your kids, your parents, and grandparents. It’s easy for everyone. Also, it is quite inexpensive, you just need to have snow shoes, in cold countries like Canada you can often find snowshoes for sale.
If you are a first-time snowshoer you need to learn some techniques before you start. Here is the perfect step-by-step guide for you:
Go up
As you know in the woods it’s not easy to climb on a snowless day, so it becomes more difficult when there is heavy snow. Don’t worry you will learn some techniques that will help you with ascending uphill:
- Place your feet firmly on the snow
- Use the kick-step technique
- Flip up the heel lift (climbing bar)
Use all the techniques, but remember that everything you do, you need to navigate yourself with your intuitions as well.
Go down
Snowshoeing downhill is another challenge. When going up you are getting tired, going down you are always afraid to fall. Here you have to be relaxed and keep your body back. Keep your poles in front of you all the time. Poles provide control, they replace our hands in snowshoeing. Anyway, you have to be careful as such things as over-swinging is not a good idea as it can throw you off balance.
Traversing Snowshoes
Side-hilling in other words traversing is used to avoid long or difficult ways. You have to keep in mind that the important thing here is balance. Push the uphill side of the snowshoe into the slope and keep your weight on the uphill snowshoe.
You can also use some tricks, for example, ask your friends to come with you and have them walk in front of you.
Never worry about falling. When you feel that you are about to fall try to fall the uphill side if you can. If you have poles, they are going to be a great help for you. Just slide them under your chest and then use them to press yourself up off the slope. If you don’t have poles you have to work with your hands, just create compacted snow for pressing yourself up.
If you are a beginner pay much attention to your snowshoes, you need to have the best snowshoes, so you won’t worry about other things than your activity. There are a lot of popular brands of women’s and men’s snowshoes. It’s always a good idea to google (e.g., “Snowshoes for sale Canada”) and to find out good brands, before going straight to the shop or to order online.
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