Angels and Ears

Angels with "the ears" in the background at Rabbit Ears Pass yesterday morning:

The silly kids doing "their thing" rolling snow angels to cool off at our
turnaround point of the day. But, we also have Rabbit Ears Peak centered
in this photo with "the ears" (the two rocks atop the peak for which Rabbit
Ears Pass is named). Nice postcard photo :)

I was secretly hoping for our first "Spring Crust" skijor of the season yesterday morning. But, unfortunately, the crust was not firm enough yet to support Jack & Rudy running as they would punch through. So, we quickly abandoned the attempt to skijor the crust and returned to established (i.e., well packed) snowmobile trails. Not to fear, a great time was still had by all!

It was "packing it in tight" to catch air on the nice shoulder of an established trail:

The "tightly packed" Jack & Rudy skijor engine. Whee!

Then it was catching air to cruise along established trails along the shores of Dumont Lake:

Whee!

Finally, it was catching air to complete the day's fun outing:

Still catching air as we are arriving at the trailhead to complete
the day's outing.

Now come along for today's "fun to the finish" skijor as we are flying towards the trailhead until I call out a "left" and we turn to slow to the finish. What fun and perfect skijor partners!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

As usual, look who is perched atop a snow wall and ready for end of run treats!

"You have our FULL attention!" says the focused, fun kids.

A short outing but still a great time had by all: 4.7 miles traveled with 400 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 21 MPH.

2025/2026 Season to Date: 52 days on the trails covering 316.2 miles with 33,400 feet of elevation climbed.

Markers

Who was having a great time out on the trails this morning?

"I'm ecstatic with the day's new snow!" declares happy Jack.
"Me TOOOOOO, WOOOOO!" adds singing Rudy :)

Today's outing took us to the Walton Peak area at Rabbit Ears Pass. There was about an inch or so of fresh, new snow and no skiers or snowmobiles had been out on the trails before us. This made for an interesting trail finding outing:

Zipping along laying fresh tracks in new snow over packed snowmobile
trails. But, can you see the trail? Neither could I!

While we've skijored this area at Rabbit Ears Pass many times, today was pretty interesting as you could not identify the set trail most of the day. I only knew we were off trail when we would sink in deep snow versus knowing we were on trail when you could feel (although not see) a firm, packed trail under the new snow. There are occasional trail markers on the pass, and we really appreciated them today!

Cruising along once again with no clear sign of the actual trail except
the orange trail marker poles you see (one on the right edge of this photo
and 2 more directly up from Rudy). Without these markers, it was not
clear we needed to veer left through this section.

Whenever we could feel, but not see, the packed trail under the snow, we knew it was time to uncork the skijoring engine. Zoom:

The fun kids catching air heading towards the right leaning trail marker
you can just make out in the upper center of this photo. 

Now come along for today's video highlight as we are "skijoring from memory" of this trail as the terrain looks identical all around us! As the clip comes to an end, we finally encounter a trail marker letting us know we are on the right track. Interesting day!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

I stopped twice to try and re-find the trail when we got off track. Well, you know what comes with stopping with Jack & Rudy!

"Stop, drop and ROLL!" goes the snow angel rolling goofballs.

A fun, but very interesting, trail tracking day, right guys?

"Yes, fun indeed, now how about those end of run treats?" says the
happy, happy kids.

Today's "trail finding" tally: 7.1 miles traveled with 800 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 21 MPH.

2025/2026 Season to Date: 51 days on the trails covering 311.5 miles with 33,000 feet of elevation climbed.

 

Lane Change

Fresh powder in the backcountry this morning! Yay for Snow!!!

The fun kids blasting through some nice powder.

Technically, we only got about 1-2 inches of fresh snow overnight. But, it was also VERY windy. As a result, we encountered many deep, wind blown snowdrifts to blast through in the backcountry this morning. Come along for today's video highlight to see what I mean.

I really love the start of this video. Jack starts on the right of the team but then decides he wants to change lanes. Watch as he perfectly backs off, dips under the gangline and then thrusts forward to be back even with Rudy (but on the left side now) - TALENTED!!!! I love watching these occasional lane changes at high speeds from these talented kids! Then, after the lane change, watch as we gallop along while blasting through the occasional wind drift. Talented again - whee!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Of course, blasting through wind drifts is quite aerobic and warrants rolling snow angels to cool off when the opportunity arose:

"Aaaaah - rolling to cool the jet!" goes the snow rolling sillies.
I Love the snow Rudy has generated all around his head by dipping it in the
snow before flipping it up. Can't you just see the expression of bliss on
his happy, snow covered face!

Then, after blasting through wind drifts and rolling snow angels, it was time to floor it on the trails at Gold Run Nordic Center. The kids know what to do with a groomed nordic trail - zoom!

Catching air on the groomie zoomie!

It turns out we were FIRST tracks on the freshly groomed trail! It's hard to see that in the prior photo, but we were first tracks. As if often the case, if we are first tracks, then there is a groomer not far ahead of us to chase and catch. Jack & Rudy love catching up with the groomer!

"Caught it, caught it! We caught the groomer!" says the speedy kids.

As I've described and shown many times in the past, the groomer drivers know us from years of skijoring these trails and, eventually, they will pull over and wave us on to pass. But, we have to wait until the trail is wide enough to do so safely. As you see in the prior photo, the trail was exactly "one groomer wide" between trees when we caught the groomer. As a result, we had to slow down and trot behind for a bit before the trees thinned and the groomer paused to wave us on, so the video is pretty boring to watch until we can pass. As usual, as we passed, I gave the driver a wave & smile and he gave an enthusiastic wave & smile back.

While the wind gave us some nice drifts to blast through, it was also still blowing while we were out. Temperatures were near 10 (F) when we started with the wind chill being well below zero, probably approaching -10 (F). As a result, the wimpy human cut today's outing a little short to save himself. But, still a fun time had by all:

The freezing human handing out end of run treats to the perfectly
comfortable Siberian Huskies! :)

A fun albeit temperature shortened skijor: 4 miles traveled with 300 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 21 MPH.

2025/2026 Season to Date: 50 days on the trails covering 304.4 miles with 32,200 feet of elevation climbed.