Good, Bad, Ugly

Yay for our second outing of the 2019/2020 season on October 12th!

Celebrating a fun day on the trails at the of this morning's run.
"It was 'interesting' but we still had a blast!" declares the happy trio.

Snow in October in Colorado typically only lasts for a few days and then it melts & dries in between storms. It is not until November or December that you expect the snow to stick between storms. We had a nice dump of snow on October 10th for our first skijor outing of the season and went out early this morning in hopes of getting one more run before this storm's snow melted.

How did it go? Well, it was The Good, The Bad and The UGLY. Come along for the details.

The shaded parts of the trail were wonderful, just look at the following example of The Good:

Beautiful October 12th conditions as Zorro, Jack and Rudy are in a fast "sprint tuck" flying
along the great conditions in the shade.

But wait, what is that in the bottom center of the prior photo? It's not "ski tips" but, instead, it is the front of our dog sled. I knew today's outing would be a mix of good and bad. Well, using skis requires good conditions. The sled, on the other hand, can handle bad conditions. We go out very early when we use the sled and expect bad conditions as the sled can bounce and slide over frozen ground just fine.

As expected, we had many stretches of The Bad. Note the narrow "ribbon of death" ice going down the center of the photo. Rudy is aligned on the ice while Zorro & Jack jog on either side. The sled is also centered on the ice. If you look closely, you can tell by my shadow that I have both feet on the left runner of the sled. The right runner can bounce & slide on frozen ground IF my weight is not on it. So, I have both feet on the left runner with just enough ice to slide down the trail behind Rudy.

The Bad - riding a "ribbon of death" ice patch down the center of the trail.

I totally expected patches of The Bad today; what I did not expect was The UGLY! We found ourselves on extended patches of no snow or ice! Zorro, Jack & Rudy can pull the sled over this completely exposed yet frozen ground; but I have to get off the sled for this to happen. I attach myself to the sled by another gangline and I try my hardest to run fast enough for my pals behind the sled. The UGLY sure is a workout for the human!

Nice view of Breckenridge Ski Resort across the valley; but what UGLY conditions on the trail!

The conditions may have been all over the map, but we still had a very fun outing. The usual antics from the youngsters at our turnaround point and the usual happy Zorro flashing me a smile.

"It's still better than summer!" declares happy Zorro.
"Rub a dub dub, love rolling in the snow!" demonstrates the goofball youngsters.

Well, that wraps up what we will get out of this past storm after much more UGLY than expected on the trails this morning. But, we did get two short & fun outings out of the storm. We'll take that in October any year! 4.8 miles traveled with 500 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 16 MPH.

2019/2020 Season to Date: 2 days on the trails covering 8.9 miles with 1100 feet of elevation climbed.