A Fukuokan's Notes from Sapporo

Shoes play a big role in life in Sapporo. A pair of well-waterproofed shoes with non-slip soles can hugely improve your quality of life and even your chances of survival here. I say this based on my bitter experience of falling and damaging my hip joint.

Because of that incident, I always wore spikes over my snow boots. But it gradually became annoying to put them on and take them off every time I entered a store, a station, or walked on a dry surface. I also started to feel a bit embarrassed using them, like riding a bicycle with training wheels. In fact, even five-year-olds don’t wear spikes in this town.

So I decided to look for a good pair of shoes that doesn’t need spikes. I visited several local shoe stores and gathered some information. Here are my notes for next season (it’s probably too late to find a good pair for this season).

(Sources: shop assistants at a local ABC MART and the Madras section of a local department store)

If you want a pair that lasts for two seasons or more, look for shoes priced around 20,000 yen or higher with Vibram Arctic Grip soles. But it’s totally fine to choose a cheaper pair if you don’t mind changing shoes every season.

Because soles designed for snowy surfaces are made of very soft materials, you should switch shoes as soon as you walk on bare roads. Otherwise, the soles will wear out quickly on hard surfaces.

People in Sapporo usually own at least two pairs of snow shoes, and replace one pair with new ones when they see the first heavy snowfall of the year.

No shoe works perfectly on every surface and terrain. A perfect pair for someone else might be shoes from hell for you.

Upper materials can be roughly divided into rubber, GORE-TEX (or similar membranes), synthetic leather, and real leather. In any case, you should apply waterproof spray about once every three wears to prevent water from getting in. In the case of real leather, you also need to polish them every week.

Soles can be replaced. So it is possible to equip your sneakers with snow-adapted soles. However, whether the upper part can withstand sub-zero temperatures and wet snow is another question.

I guess (or hope, or wish, to be precise) that some of this information might be exaggerated because of their profession, but at the moment I still can’t tell which parts are sales talk and which are sincere advice.