Page 294 - The Lost Ways

- By M. Richard -

“My old grandmother always used to say, summer
friends will melt away like summer snows, but

winter friends are friends forever.”

– George R.R. Martin

Winter is the worst time to try to survive. If you think about it, back when we

were primarily an agricultural society, life was built around preparing to make it through
the winter. Crops were grown, harvested, and preserved with the idea of making it
through the winter and to the next planting season.

We’ve even memorialized this in a way in the creation of the holiday Thanksgiving. The
Pilgrims celebrated that they were prepared for winter and that they were going to

survive.

There are many things about wintertime that make it a hard time to survive. Everything
from the temperature to the lack of food is working against you. But one that we don’t
often think about is the difficulty of moving through the snow. Just getting around in the
winter without snow plows to clear our roads is a bit of a challenge.

Getting around in the winter can be dangerous as well. Fighting through the snow can
make you sweat, which makes you much more liable to fall victim to hypothermia. You
need a way of moving through the snow that will help keep you from having to work too
hard.

Fortunately, our ancestors solved this problem for us with the creation of snowshoes.

Actually, skis were created with the same idea, but it’s much easier to make and use a
pair of snowshoes than it is to make and use a pair of skis. About the only thing special
you have to do to walk in snowshoes is walk with your feet far apart.

293