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| We just finished our hot dog treats that we always share at the high point of our outings. "YUM, <smack>, <lick>!" says Max!!! |
Just when it looked like summer was going to take hold and stick - back comes a blast of winter. It started snowing again Thu afternoon/night, so Max, Zorro & I hit the slopes for another skijoring outing Friday morning!
Our Goal: to once again Skijor the Breckenridge Ski Resort. Since the ski resort does such a wonderful job of packing and preserving snowpack during the season, there is a pretty significant base still covering the mountain. We figured some fresh snow and the deep base would make for a great outing...
The Reality: apparently someone at the ski resort got the bright idea that it might actually be summer sometime this year in the Colorado high country. As a result, they have been plowing "forest service roads" across the mountain to open up paths for biking/hiking. They have also been running deep groomers over the more popular summer hiking/biking trails to break up the snow base and try to get it to melt quicker. The impact to our skijoring outing: (1) the forest service roads left 4-6 foot deep cuts across some of our intended path (see picture below); (2) the deep groomed terrain left slick & FAST conditions for my Siberian pals to launch me down with reckless abandon ;-)
All in, a very fun outing but probably our last tour of the ski resort this season - too much carving up the terrain in hopes that summer will really arrive sometime in June...
Vital Stats: 6.2 miles; 90m total time; 65m moving time (25m non-moving due to a few breaks and navigating hazards); 5.7 MPH moving average; 17 MPH top speed; 1500 feet of elevation gain (and then loss) - WOW!
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| Our path on the Breckenridge Ski Resort - highlighted in magenta (click to enlarge): (1) skijor straight up the Four O'Clock ski run to Vista Haus. (2) skijor down/across the Columbine "connector run" to Claimjumper. (3) skijor down Claimjumper, sweeping left & right across the run, to the base of Peak 8. |
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| A look back at our path up the Four O'Clock ski run. The run leveled out nicely in the portion shown, note that it looks like the run "drops off a cliff" at the far end - it was a very steep section that Max & Zorro powered us up! |
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| Taking our "high point break" at Vista Haus. |
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| Max & Zorro's thoughts on our break at Vista Haus, "Why are we stopped, the trail looks GREAT this way!!!" |
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| Zorro cooling his nose with some fresh snow. |
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| A forest service road cut across the Claimjumper ski run. To the left is the ski run, we had to scale down this 6 foot drop off to get across the service road and continue down Claimjumper. We encountered 3 of these nasty roads cut across our path - each providing a 4-6 foot solid drop off we had to negotiate (on skis!) to continue the path down! |
Hey Brad love looking at your blog. I live in Kansas City and am skiing March 14-18. I have a 16 month old Alaskan Malamute I am bringing with the hopes of doing just what you have been doing! My problem is I have never x-country skied and neither has Atka, that's where you come in. Do you have any good areas that I might be able to do that in Wildernest? If maybe we could meet up for 1 day that would be incredible! My condo I am staying in backs to the BLM that looks really good. Any ideas? Also love the loop you do in Breckinridge, looks awesome. I am a young 48 year old dude and run with Atka most days 4-7 miles a day so we are both fairly fit.
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