Wind Snow

A windy day skijoring up on Boreas Pass today. It was snowing on & off all day yesterday, so the trees were full of fresh snow. Every time a big gust blew, tons of snow came flying off the trees and onto Max, Zorro & I. It was a day of fresh (and deep) powder on the trails and lots of "wind snow" in the air.

No, my camera is not broken and taking fuzzy pictures... The "fuzz" is snow blowing off the trees
with a gust of wind. The old relic in the photo is Bakers Tank - a remnant of the days when
Boreas Pass was the railroad route from the mountains to Denver.

Our most intense encounter with the "wind snow" was on our route up from Indiana Creek to Boreas Pass. The upper portions of this trail travels tightly through a thick forest of trees. The trees all had lots of fresh snow from yesterday on their branches. At one point a strong gust of wind came blowing through the thick trees. Snow started falling and swirling all around us and I could no longer see Max & Zorro only 6-7 feet in front of me. I could feel them still going via the gangline, so I dipped my head rode it out. Once this extended gust finally let up, I looked back and was shocked to see we'd traveled 30-40 yards during this complete whiteout - just trusting the Siberians at the front to keep going - good boys!

Vital Stats: 8.8 miles from the Indiana Creek winter trailhead up to Boreas Pass Rd and down to the Boreas winter trailhead; 1350 feet of elevation climbed (a steep & deep route up and out of Indiana Creek); 115m total time; 105m skijoring time; 20 MPH top speed.

Less than a mile from the Indiana Creek trailhead - untouched, fresh snow found
us breaking trail in 8-12 inches most of the 1350 foot climb out of Indiana Creek!

Still less than a mile into the outing and still breaking trail....

Eating snow cones at our break point before cruising down to the Boreas
trailhead. Look closely, you can see Max's tongue sampling the yummy
snow. Zorro is chomping down on his snow cone.