Extreme Powder

An extreme trail breaking day.

12+ inches on the main trail & 24+ inches on the side trails!

"As deep as me - wheeee!" expresses happy trail breaking Max.

We headed to one of the fun "powder trails" this morning with the intent of going up, down and across Baldy Mountain. We were first to the trail and started the day breaking trail in about 12 inches of powder; and it only got deeper & deeper from there...

About 30 yards from the Baldy Mountain Trailhead and we have the foot of snow
all to ourselves!

Baldy Mountain consists of a heavily used main trail and whole network of lesser used side trails. The main trail would have been tracked & packed yesterday; so the fresh 12 inches we found was all "new snow overnight"! After heading up the main trail for a while, we decided to turn onto one of our favorite side trails. Well, the side trail had been untouched for the duration of this current storm leading to an untouched trail of 24-30 inches of powder - see below!

"Deeper than me - up, up & away!" demonstrates the tall trail breaking pro Max.
What a nice shot of the athletic Max launching himself into the snow.
"I'll follow back here!" says cute little Zorro in a snow wall behind Max that is
taller than him!

The snow is at least 2 feet deep and Max is able to launch himself completely out of the
snow as he breaks trail. Impressive!

Well, we only made it a little ways on the first side trail before deciding "wow, that's deep!" and coming back to the main trail.

Back on the main trail retracing our path to check some other side trails. Zorro and I are riding
in the track we set on the way up. Max, on the other hand, says "Back to a piddly 12 inches.
I'll keep breaking trail over here."

We arrived at another of our favorite side trails and it was "second verse, same as the first" with 24-30 inches of untouched snow!

Swimming in the snow on the second side trail we went to explore.

Nice thing about an "out & back" side trail is that you get to ride in the trail you carved
on the return leg. Trail breaking Max is happy to let Zorro run in lead on all the return legs.
A pretty nice looking trail we cut in the deep snow, huh?

It was then back to the main trail and we went up a little further to explore yet a third side trail. Well, you guessed it, "third verse, same as the first" - an untouched 24-30 inch trail breaking exercise. A little out & back on the third side trail and it was back to the main trail to return back to the trailhead.

Wheeee - the main trail seems so easy after our 3 side trail excursions as we quickly
descend down our up tracks to return home.

Breaking trail in 12-30 inches lead to a short but very aerobic 5.1 miles with 600 feet of elevation climbed.

2013/2014 Season to Date: 80 days on the trails covering 686.9 miles with 80,700 feet of elevation climbed.