-46C
Everett, Canada
It’s cold out this week. It was no surprise: Environment Canada had been issuing extreme temperature and blizzard warnings since before the weekend, but when the mercury really drops it always seems to catch me unawares. I’m a happy camper up until about -25C or so. I’ll even put on tights and go for a run, as long as the wind chill factor doesn’t make things colder than about -28C (seems to be my threshold: I’ve had frost bitten earlobes that prove it). But this time, its different. It was-40C when I woke up this morning with wind chill pushing things down to -46. After checking the weather I promptly went back to bed and pondered the simplicity of my dilemma; if I go outside, my exposed skin will freeze in under 2 minutes. Action, reaction. At about 10.30 I was woken up by a brilliant sun, already making a heroic attempt to raise spirits and temperatures in its’ romp across the sky to; A for effort, Mr. Sun, but no dice. The thermometer had risen to -35C but the wind was still up so I went out and bought a new pair of mitts and toque in hopes that this small gesture would be noticed by the weather gods, and the wind would relent enough to let me do something fun outside. Success! Within half an hour the wind had died down enough to safely venture outside for more than a few seconds. I grabbed my snowshoes and poles, slipped into a few extra layers of clothing and made a dash for the River Valley.
I’ve recently acquired a new pair of Ecco boots. I have been testing the Chamonix boots I received as a Sherpa, but I decided that I would also like something a little less cumbersome. Don’t get me wrong, the Chamonix boots will have their place in my future adventures but I am beginning preparations for an outing in mid-march where snowshoes will be required. I find that I prefer to be shod in something that will allow my foot to react nimbly and rely on the snowshoes to do more of the “brute force” type work. Enter the Ecco Kolyma boot: Short, soft, ample heel counter for rough hiking but light and agile enough for scrambling. I’ve been wearing them all around town for about a week now, and the boots are promising. Today would be a first real test; how will they react on my snow shoes, in -40C weather?
