Just Enough

There was just enough snow coverage between tire tracks for me to safely let Jack & Rudy floor it in French Gulch this morning!

The kids zipping along as my skis are in the "just enough snow coverage"
between the tire tracks to skijor safely. Wheeee!

Our outing took us out & back in French Gulch. As is usual, the further (and higher) we went, the better the conditions got. Midway out the gulch, the snow between the tire tracks was excellent for skiing:

Jack's footprints showing just how nice the snow down the middle of
the trail was midway out the gulch.

Eventually, the handful of private cabins in the gulch end and, as a result, French Gulch transitions into a true backcountry trail. Few others make it this far out the gulch, so any pre-existing ski tracks are single tracks and Jack & Rudy run single file to fit (as the snow outside the set track is too deep to keep pace). While we go slower in single file configuration, we, by no means, go SLOW :)

The fun kids running as fast as possible in single file configuration.

Today we eventually out skied ALL existing tracks and were making our own trail for a while. Once it was time to turnaround, the comedians got into their usual antics:

"Turnaround, roll around!" declares snow rolling Jack.
"Turnaround, woos abound!" sings vocal Rudy.

Rudy actually rolled a snow angel before singing as you can see the indentation in the snow around him and all the snow on his back from rolling around. So, today was "Stop, drop, roll and WOO" from talented Rudy :)

We were having such a great time, we didn't want the outing to end. So, as we were finishing our out & back in French Gulch, we hung a left onto the Sallie Barber Mine Trail (which shares the trailhead parking lot with French Gulch). Sallie Barber is a true backcountry trail, so it was safe to let the kids uncork it the entire way on this "out & back" extension to our outing:

Zipping along great conditions on Sallie Barber. Wheeee!

Back to the first photo and the title of today's blog: come along for today's video highlight as there is just enough snow between tire tracks for me to ski safely and let Jack & Rudy put the pedal to the metal!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Finally, back to the trailhead and Rudy won "king of the mountain" today finding the highest point of the snow wall to perch himself for end of run treats:

Rudy just a smidget higher than Jack on the snow wall to win
"king of the mountain" today :)

An enjoyable outing with the full range of conditions in French Gulch and a nice extra extension on Sallie Barber Mine: 8.4 miles traveled with 900 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 22 MPH.

2024/2025 Season to Date: 76 days on the trails covering 593.6 miles with 56,400 feet of elevation climbed.