I took these on the hike back to Logan Pass from Hidden Lake in the early evening.  Both pictures have hikers in the frame.  You’ll have to look a little harder in the second one.  Like I said in a previous post, it was pretty weird walking across deep snow in the middle of July.  It was also very slippery.  I had to try very hard not to fall because I was carrying two cameras, my Canon 40D with the 70-200mm f2.8 + 1.4x teleconverter and my Canon 5D with the 24-105mm f4 lens.  That was about $6K worth of equipment around my neck…definitely not something I wanted to fall on.  Thankfully, I didn’t, but there were a few close calls.

Why carry so much equipment?  I carry the 40D combo for shooting wildlife and the 5D combo for shooting the landscapes.  I don’t like to constantly change lenses as I hike, so I carry both so I don’t have too.  Wildlife doesn’t usually hold still long enough to change lenses and still get the shot.  Even landscapes can change quickly (clouds/shadows moving across the scene, rainbows that appear suddenly and then disappear just as quickly, etc.) and you don’t want to miss a great shot because you were busy swapping lenses.  Besides, the more often you change lenses in the field, the greater your chances of getting a dirty sensor, exposing your electronics to the elements, or simply just dropping a lens.  I’m willing to carry a little extra weight (one extra camera body) to prevent that.

I love going barefoot. I never wear shoes at home, even in the winter. But it’s never been very practical when I go out. Now, it is. These are one of my new pairs of Vibram FiveFingers. They have very thin vibram soles on them so they feel like you’re barefoot, but you still have some protection. I have a second pair with mesh uppers that I plan on wearing when I hike. I’m also considering wearing these when I run.

I had a little bit of discomfort when I first started wearing these. My little toe likes to curl under its neighbor (probably a side effect of having to wear shoes), but was forced out by the material between the toes of these "shoes’. After wearing them a while, my little toe on both feet would start to ache. But, now that I’ve been wearing them on and off for a few days, that discomfort seems to be disappearing. I wore them for 4-5 hours today with only minimal discomfort near the end.

They do look a little weird, though.