Today was something we have never done before: skijoring the Middle Fork trail at Swan Valley in May - wow!
 |
| 5-8 inches of untouched snow on the Middle Fork trail on May 10th. Wonderfully unbelievable! |
Of course we have skijored other trails at Swan Valley in May, but never Middle Fork. The Middle Fork trail is the most sun exposed and most drained into trail at Swan Valley; so this trail is usually dead for skijoring by mid April. In fact, it was a dead trail for the past month. But, we got a surprise dump of 5-8 inches of new snow on Middle Fork last night. So, "Woo Hoo, off to Middle Fork we go!" exclaimed Max, Zorro & I this morning.
Middle Fork is probably our favorite of all the trails in Swan Valley. It is my favorite for its gentle and rolling terrain. It is Max & Zorro's favorite because we see moose from the Middle Fork almost every time we skijor this trail - thus the nickname "Moose Fork" for this fun trail. Today was no exception as we encountered two moose in the adjacent meadow as we were returning from our "out & back" run on Middle Fork. Follow the moose fun below:
 |
| The two moose are circled in the photo above. They started moving away from the trail as the "moose juiced" sled dogs approached. Nothing gets Max & Zorro juiced like moose! |
Below is the video counterpart to the previous moose photo. Notice in the beginning the very bumpy terrain that Max & Zorro are politely taking carefully with me. But, then the moose alarms go off and it is pedal to the metal and "careful" is tossed out the window as we become a moose seeking skijoring vehicle - hang on, human!
[watch on youtube if no video loads below]
As is common for May, the snow was heavy & wet and the temperatures were in the low to mid 30s. It is serious work to propel the human through heavy, wet snow as you can tell below:
 |
| Rolling snow angels to cool off at our midpoint of the day. "Whew, having a great time, but need to cool off!" demonstrate the funny pair. |
Wet & heavy snow with warm temperatures just means we go a little slower and less far; it does not mean we do not have tons of fun. See for yourself:
 |
| You do not see happier faces on any dog in the world compared to Max & Zorro's happy love of skijoring! |
2013/2014 Season to Date: 145 days on the trails covering 1259.8 miles with 144,100 feet of elevation climbed.
No comments:
Post a Comment