Hello Moose

Look who we ran into at the French Gulch Trailhead this morning!

"Hello mother & child moose! Yikes!"
Needless to say, I took this photo from inside the Jeep!

We actually ran into this mother & child moose on French Gulch Road as we were driving to the trailhead. They then slowly sauntered up the road, with us driving slowly behind, until arriving at the trailhead parking lot. Then, finally, mother & child meandered out of the parking lot and into the woods. Needless to say, Max & Zorro were kept inside the Jeep (much to their PROTESTS) until the moose were gone!

Once it was safe to get out of the car, we were thrilled to find miles of untouched fresh snow on the popular French Gulch Trail. Such a treat to get the chance to lay fresh tracks on this trail!

Wheeee - laying fresh tracks on French Gulch. The prints down the trail in front of us are
fox tracks. Nothing but us and a fox on the morning's fresh snow!

Far back in French Gulch and we were shaded from the morning sun by the mountains to our left as we continued to lay fresh tracks the entire "out direction"! What fun!

Laying freshies in the morning shade. So peaceful.

Once we turned around, we ran back in our own tracks until getting into lower French Gulch where at least one group had been out/back while we were skijoring to the far end of the gulch. This means the trail was getting a little more packed and this means Max & Zorro go fast. Come along for a short video excerpt of our peaceful glide in French Gulch:

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

I turned us around earlier than normal in the gulch so that we could skijor the road. Knowing we'd been out in the gulch long enough for the moose to be gone, we got to skijor the road and sniff fairly recent moose prints. Yum!

"Oooh, these ARE fresh smelling!" say Max & Zorro dipping their noses into the moose
tracks all around us. Look at the size of that moose footprint in the lower left of this photo.
What big & beautiful animals (from a distance :)

Moose at the trailhead, fresh tracks in the gulch and then moose prints to finish off the day: 9.1 miles traveled with 800 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 20 MPH.

2016/2017 Season to Date: 86 days on the trails covering 705.8 miles with 76,200 feet of elevation climbed.