Floating in the Dead Sea in KSO Vibram Five Fingers

By Justin Owings on Mar 4, 2010 | In User Stories | 3 comments »

Krisjand is snaps a photo while floating in the Dead Sea near Masada, Israel. The concentration of salt in the Dead Sea is so great that buoyancy is no problem!

Vibram Five Fingers KSO wearer Krisjand was recently traveling around Israel and toured Masada, an ancient fortress and historic stronghold adjacent to the Dead Sea.

Armed, or shall I say "footed," with his black KSO VFFs, Krisjand took the opportunity to float in the Dead Sea, which is known for it's buoyancy due to it being a salt lake*.

I asked Krisjand to share a bit about his VFF'ed photo above as well as what he's been doing in his Five Fingers and here's what he had to say:

Justin,

Yeah, me and my friends were about 20-30 feet off shore in the photo. Couldn't get more than chest deep if we wanted. I'm glad I had my KSOs, since the banks were pretty mean with the salt crystals. Definitly saved my feet as compared to my buds.

I initially bought my KSOs after doing some reading about barefoot running. I had a knee injury and surgery to remove part of my meniscus. Took a little getting used to, but found them to be great for running either indoor or out-door (though gave me some mean blisters when tried on a treadmill). I wore them outside until it started to snow (though after it rained and iced, they gripped much better than my regular running shoes) and ran an indoor track. I found that they just go too cold once wet for winter here in Germany. I have also worn them as a scuba diving boot, worked pretty well. I plan to take them with me to Afghanistan here shortly and continue running in them. Let y'all know how they hold up.

Oh, and about a week after I started running in them, a guy in my office got a pair and now everyone in his family wants some. I think once people get past the look, they see how great they are.

Krisjand.

Thanks for sharing, Krisjand. It's good to hear you're putting your VFFs to such good use (and in so may ways). Congrats on running again despite the knee injury!

Have safe travels and enjoy spreading the Vibram word around the world!

* Per Wikipedia, "The salt concentration of the Dead Sea fluctuates around 31.5%. This is unusually high and results in a nominal density of 1.24 kg/L. Anyone can easily float in the Dead Sea because of natural buoyancy."

About the Author — I founded BirthdayShoes.com in April 2009 on realizing just how much I enjoyed having "free feet" - I mostly wanted to use them for weights, sprints, and plyometrics (I'm not much of a runner!). I'm a Googler by day and minimalist footwear aficionado by night; you can find me 'round Atlanta. If you want to catch up with what I'm doing outside of the site here, follow me on twitter @bdayshoes or @justinno or check out my personal site JustinOwings.com.
Justin Owings+ has written 754 articles and 302 comments.