Road Run

Nice shot of Jack & Rudy breaking trail in 10+ inches of new snow as we crest at Sally Barber Mine.

Impressive shot of the youngsters breaking trail and towing me up & past the mine!

We did a "split run" today where we started with the youngsters (Jack & Rudy) and then eventually met up with Zorro to add him in for the end of the run. A great day to exercise the kids in the fresh snow around Sally Barber Mine and then finish the day with a nice, easy cool down with elder Zorro.

We started on the lesser used west side of Sally Barber and found a few existing tracks at the trailhead. We quickly caught and passed those on the trail before us and, as you see in the first photo, then found ourselves breaking trail for a few miles climbing to the mine. The reward for towing me up? Well, we got to open up the throttle in set tracks going down the east (and popular) side of the trail. Zoom!

Nice shot of Jack & Rudy each taking one "set track" and uncorking the skijor engine. Zoom!

I mentioned the other day that young Rudy apparently needed to re-learn his "on by" tactics this season. Well, as it turns out, Rudy only needs to WANT to "on by", he still understands the concept completely - he showed me that twice today! Classic Rudy - he "knows" he just has to "want to" :)

"Yeah, yeah, look - I get it - I just have to want to!" demonstrates perfect 'on by' Rudy.

The original plan was for us to meet with Zorro at the Sally Barber/French Gulch trail intersection and then skijor out/back in French Gulch. But, once we got to the French Gulch Trail with Zorro, we found the trail untouched and we'd be breaking trail in 6-10 inches of snow in the gulch. Well, we do not want 11.5 year old Zorro to be breaking trail much anymore, so we turned around to check the status of French Gulch Road (the road leading to the trailhead). We were thrilled to find that the plows had not been on the road yet and only 4WD vehicles had been on the road. This made for a perfect "easy finish" for us to run with Zorro. Jack & Rudy took one tire track and Zorro the other and we skijored a few miles on the road to end the day - perfect for Zorro!

Yay, we beat the plows out and have 4WD tracks to use as a pseudo groomed trail!

Here we go with today's short video highlight. Come along as we skijor French Gulch Road gliding in 4WD tracks with deep snow in the middle and on the shoulders of the road. Wheeee!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Finally, as usual, we ended the day celebrating with 'end of run treats' with my happy & focused partners.

"You have our COMPLETE attention!" says the focused trio :)

A perfect mix today exercising the youngsters in deeper snow and then running a packed road to end the morning with Zorro: 9.7 miles traveled with 700 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 21 MPH.

2019/202 Season to Date: 22 days on the trails covering 139.3 miles with 14,150 feet of elevation climbed.