Cat Tracks

Endless miles of fresh snowcat tracks to follow out Harrison Creek at Rabbit Ears Pass this morning!

Zipping along in fresh snowcat tracks. Wheeee!

How did I know the snowcat tracks were fresh? Well, they were soft and super easy to glide along in. When snowcat tracks get stale (meaning they refreeze overnight), they get hard and very choppy. Jack, Rudy and I often have to abandon stale snowcat tracks we encounter as that is hard their feet and my knees. But, this morning was fresh, soft and perfect. We went along for miles and miles!!!

Far out in the Colorado backcountry. Pretty!

As we were cruising along, I realized these were really mini snowcat tracks. Mini, you ask? Well here you go when we intersected the cat coming back on the trail:

I'm sure it has a name other than "mini snowcat", but that's what I call it :)
"Hi dude, thanks for the tracks!" says Jack & Rudy to the cat driver.

As the driver got next to me, he stopped and opened his window to say, "Cool dogs! That's awesome!" as he had watched us running towards him before I stopped Jack & Rudy as we got close. Since he made such nice tracks for us this morning, I said, "Do you know the winter snowmobile shortcut on the other side of the next meadow?" (If you snowmobile up here, you'd know what I was referring to). He responded, "I sure do," to which I replied, "These two tell me the elk tracks at the shortcut are VERY fresh!" (it is still hunting season). His eyes lit up (as this shortcut was at most 5 minutes for him to intersect),  he gave me the thumbs up, closed his window and sped off quickly. 

If you are willing to make some nice cat tracks for us, we'll tell you where the elk have recently been.

On to today's video highlight. Outside of meeting the snowcat driver in the photo above, we did not see another soul on the trails! It was miles and miles and miles of jogging, sprinting and trotting deep into the backcountry. Come along and watch some of the fun yourself:

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Such a beautiful morning, how about another pretty shot?

Inside Jack getting into a tuck for the gentle left in the trail.
Outside Rudy flying around left alongside.

Sadly (for Jack & Rudy), we had to turnaround eventually and head back. I swear they would have gone ALL day on today's perfect conditions. Well, if you have to turnaround:

"Stop, Drop and ROLL!" goes the snow angel sillies at our turnaround point.

Back to the trailhead and just enough of a snow wall to get end of run treats from me standing (yay, my old knees appreciate it :)

"Fun day, perfect trail!" exclaims the happy kids.

A beautiful and perfect day: 9.7 miles traveled with 900 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 23 MPH (our top speed of the season, although we'll certainly hit 26 MPH once the conditions allow).

20232024 Season to Date: 22 days on the trails covering 177.5 miles with 17,100 feet of elevation climbed.