This to That

Oops!!!! :)

"I triple dog dare you to play back!" Rudy challenges to Jack.
"Cannot turn down a 'triple dog dare'!" responds Jack.
Oh sweet, mellow Jack, you fell for wild Rudy's antics :)

Unauthorized trail play from the kids aside, we had a very entertaining skijor at Rabbit Ears Pass this morning. We started with the intent of going out/back the Buffalo Park Trail. While the trail looked well used at the trailhead, we were surprised to find all signs of trail disappeared quickly and only solo snowmobile tracks going every which direction remained. A TON of snow has fallen on Rabbit Ears the past week which explains why the actual trail was missing and only random snowmobile tracks existed!

Following a snowmobile track through this vast meadow.
The actual Buffalo Park Trail is far to our left but buried and unseeable
under feet of snow!

While skijoring in snowmobile tracks is no problem, I did not like that the tracks were no where near the actual trail. We then found a track leading us away from Buffalo Park and towards the Harrison Creek Trail. I redirected us this way to use the track to get to Harrison Creek. I could see the track went far, so, even if it eventually turned, we'd be able to break trail and complete our reroute to Harrison Creek.

The Harrison Creek Trail gets a lot of snowmobile traffic, so my goal was simply to get on more established trails instead of the haphazard tracks in Buffalo Park. What did find? Holy moly, Harrison Creek had been freshly groomed! We were first tracks on a groomie zoomie for the rest of the outing! Sweet!

First tracks on the fresh groom. What a surprise find!

For all our skijor outings I have a "default plan" which I share with Nancy so she knows where & when to pick us up. But, occasionally, I change the plan and send her a text to report the new plan and wait for her reply to know she got the text. Well, once we found the fresh groom on Harrison Creek, I stopped to text her a new plan as we had to use the fresh groomie zoomie. Some little red boy was less than impressed with the speed of texting technology :)

"WOOOOO! Come on, let's GOOOO!" booms impatient Rudy.
"I'm ok waiting until we confirm our new plan." declares cool, happy Jack.

It was well worth that "forever slow text exchange" to make use of the fresh groom. Come along for a glimpse into the fun. We start out gliding along a freshly groomed flat trail. Then, eventually, the trail takes a downward angle and ZOOM go Jack & Rudy knowing they have gravity's help to propel the human along :)

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Back to the trailhead for end of run treats and, yep, you guessed it, the kids found a snow wall to climb to elevated treats!

"We'll climb so you can hand them out faster!" says the fun kids.
Apparently I am slow at kneeling when I have to come to their level,
so they've fixed the glitch :)

From haphazard snowmobile tracks to a groomie zoomie. What a "from this to that" outing! 8.4 miles traveled with 800 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 24 MPH.

2022/2023 Season to Date: 118 days on the trails covering 1046.2 miles with 95,200 feet of elevation climbed.