With a pair of snowshoes, the woods you know from summer stay walkable under snow, and they turn into a different place: quieter, slower, full of tracks.
- What changes when you cross snowy woods on foot, from the sound to the prints left on the surface
- The gear for your first outing, snowshoes included, and how to dress in layers
- Technique on flat ground, uphill and downhill
- Where to go for your first snowshoe hike, and the check to run every time before you head out
The Winter Woods at a Slower Pace
The first thing you notice, walking into the woods after a snowfall, is that the noise has gone. You can still hear the creek, but muffled. The road down in the valley disappears, and even your own voice seems to carry less far. Fresh snow is padding laid over everything: the gaps between the crystals stay full of air, and that porous structure soaks up much of the sound, much like the panels in a recording studio. What’s left is your stride, the crunch of snow packing down underfoot, and your breath.
Without snowshoes, those woods are hard going. In deep fresh snow you sink to the knee, and within a hundred feet or so your legs are burning. Try pressing a finger into new snow: it sinks right in. Lay your open palm down with the same force and it stays almost on top. A snowshoe does the same thing for your foot — it widens the footprint and spreads your body weight over a much larger surface, so you float on the snow instead of punching through it. All it takes is the legs of someone who hikes in summer, no mountaineering skills required: in winter, the mountains belong to walkers too.
Then there are the tracks. Fresh snow keeps a record of whoever passed through overnight: the near-perfect line of a fox, setting one paw directly in front of the other; the clusters of four left by a hare, its hind feet landing ahead of the front ones; prints that stop dead at the base of a fir, where a squirrel went up. Those animals were there in summer too, but they left nothing written down. In winter the woods keep the log, and reading it becomes part of the walk.
Your pace slows on its own. On snowshoes you move more slowly than on the same trail in July, and it’s worth accepting that rather than fighting it, because snowshoeing is at its best when you treat it as a long walk. If you’ve tried forest bathing, you’ll recognize something here: your attention stops racing ahead and settles on what’s actually around you, a branch shedding its load of snow, low light slanting between the trunks. Of everything the mountains offer in winter, this is what I’d recommend to anyone who loves to walk, because it asks for very little technique and leaves plenty of time to look around.
What You Need for Your First Outing
First, the snowshoes: you’ll find them at any outdoor or sporting goods store. For your first few times you can rent a pair, so you find out whether you enjoy it before buying. Alongside the snowshoes you’ll want two poles with snow baskets, the wide discs near the tip that keep the pole from sinking. Your summer trekking poles will do, as long as the small baskets can be swapped for winter ones.
On your feet you need waterproof hiking boots, stiff enough to handle the grip of the bindings. Over the boots go gaiters, which close the gap between boot and pants: without them, snow gets in with every step, melts, and for the rest of the day your foot is walking in a cold, wet sock.
How to Walk in Snowshoes
On flat ground you walk almost normally, with your feet a little wider apart than usual so one snowshoe doesn’t step on the edge of the other. Lift your foot just enough and set it down without dragging, letting the poles keep time. The first few outings are more tiring than you’d expect, because every step moves a bit of extra weight with your legs set wider: plan on more time than you’d need for a summer trail of the same length.
On climbs, shorten your stride and let the front of the snowshoe do the work, since that’s where the teeth under the binding plate bite into the snow. Many models also have a heel lift, a bar that flips up under your heel: on steeper grades it keeps the heel higher and takes load off your calves, and it should go back down as soon as the ground levels out.
Going downhill, shift your weight slightly back, keep your knees soft and land heel first, so the snowshoe digs into the snow and acts as a brake. Lengthening your poles an inch or two helps you keep them out in front without hunching forward.
Your First Snowshoe Hike, on a Marked Trail
Make your first outing on a packed, marked trail, or go with a guide. Many mountain resorts and Nordic centers set up dedicated snowshoe routes every winter, with trail markers and poles, where the track is already broken and you can find your way even when snow covers everything. Mountain guides and local outfitters run group outings: besides picking the route to suit the day’s conditions, they teach you the stride as you walk.
Before you head out, every time, check the avalanche forecast — in the US you’ll find your regional avalanche center through avalanche.org. That goes for a short loop on a marked trail too, because snow conditions change from one day to the next. Leaving the marked trails means taking up a different activity, one that calls for different gear and specific training.
At some point, stop, pull back your hood and listen to how little you can hear.