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| Sources: Flickr & Pixabay |
I know that more than one woman has a shoe collection so vast it needs a closet. Not me. In fact, this looks like a bit of a nightmare.
Having made that righteous statement, I will confess to enough of a winter shoe collection that I can understand the impulse. Each purpose has its own shoe....
Here's my Winter Shoe Collection.
These are my all-purpose winter boots for outdoor walking at home and in the forest.
Combined with these snowshoes,
they become the workhorse of trail making.
This is the start of the most recent trail, a fat quarter of a mile, tramped down 3 times. Yes, it's a lot of work. But it's done once per significant snowfall, and lasts until it melts or the next snowstorm.
I usually stay with the above combo until the trail gets a few dog walks, which helps pack it a little more. At that point, I switch back to my boots or these smaller snowshoes, which are easy to walk in on a packed trail. These are one of a pair my parents bought. Snowshoeing didn't work out for them, and they gave them to us. Ron didn't want his pair, and we traded it for some pet sitting. I kept mine and have find them a great transitional snowshoe.
Trail conditions change with the weather. As the snow melts and we get some thaw/freeze cycles, it can get icy. At that point my boots don't have good enough traction, and snowshoes don't work on ice (ergo, SNOWshoes!), so I switch to this combination:
It's a pair of old leather boots that are just right for a pair of YakTrax. YakTrax are traction cleats that give a solid footing on ice.
If I just need to take the kitchen compost to the outdoor compost bin, I use these.
They're a pair of beach shoes I got for my trip to Costa Rica and now use as house slippers. As it happens, they have terrific traction on hard snow and ice. No protection, though, so trips of a few steps only!
Finally, I have dress boots. I got these for work, and now use them when I go to town and don't want to look too hick-ish.
Now, about my running shoe collection.......
"It doesn't matter how great your shoes are if you don't accomplish anything in them."
------Martina Boone
