Slush Layer

We had a layer of slush atop the trails on our run at Vail Pass this morning.

For the first time this magical 2013/2014 skijoring season we can see deteriorating conditions suggesting that we really won't be able to skijor through the summer :-)

A slush layer has two impacts on the outing, as shown below:

You can see the tracks Max & Zorro are laying in the slush layer.
Slush is wet & heavy which means it slows the outing as it is extra work to run through
(think about running on sand, that is similar to running on slush)

The other side effect of a slush layer is slush bombs!
A slush bomb is a junk of slush that flies off Max & Zorro's feet and pelts the poor
musher behind them. The "white blob" in the upper right of this photo is a slush bomb
that just flew up from the trail behind Zorro and into the GoPro.
I always joke I need mud flaps on Max & Zorro during slush runs :-)

Today's video highlight showcases the side effects of the slush layer. You can see Max & Zorro going a little slower than normal as they work through the heavy top layer and if you watch closely you can see the occasional slush bomb flying back into the poor guy on skis. But, it is still skijoring on May 25th, so no complaints from any of us!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Any problems with the slush layer slowing us down? Let's ask...

"Nope! No problem. Still on snow on May 25th and we are as happy as can be!"
exclaim my snow loving pals.

A fun, albeit slush slowed, run atop Vail Pass today covering 7 miles with 800 feet of elevation climbed and a modest top speed of 16 MPH.

2013/2014 Season to Date: 152 days on the trails covering 1314.2 miles with 149,900 feet of elevation climbed.

Zorro Shoes

We always jokingly talk about Zorro having "built-in snowshoes" on his feet - here is a great example of what we mean:

Max & I are on the hard packed trail - if either of us step off the packed trail, we would sink
into 6-12 inches of snow. Notice the holes poking through the snow on the left of the trail,
some poor animal without built-in snowshoes sunk through. Now look at Zorro happily
trotting outside the set trail with no worry of "breaking through" - thus our reference to his
built-in snowshoes. He can frequently run "out of track" and not break into the deep snow
like Max or I would...

We expected icy conditions for our outing today; so we took a path to minimize the downhill slope: 3.6 miles to ascend up a steep 1150 feet and then spread the 1150 feet descent over a much safer 5 miles. A perfect route for icy and/or fast packed trails.

Transitioning onto Boreas Pass Rd - time to start the 5 mile jog down.

"Wait, let's cool off first!" as Max rolls a snow angel and Zorro chomps
down on snow cones.

Airborne Siberians jogging fast as we approach the finish...

The route: start at the Indiana Creek trailhead and take a steep trail to connect high up on Boreas Pass Rd and then jog down the much more gentle Boreas Pass Rd to the Boreas winter trailhead. We covered 8.6 miles with 1150 feet of elevation climbed and a mild top speed of 16 MPH. I did not want to encourage a "20 MPH sprint" and risk encountering ice at these speeds, so we kept the pace for the day at a safe & enjoyable jog.

Steep Day

The themes of today's skijor outing were "steep" and "climbing" as we ascended around 1700 feet in a short 6.5 mile outing. About 4 miles of the outing was uphill, with a quick 2.5 miles of downhill. A lot of Siberian power needed to haul me uphill!

Feet in unison as the Siberian pair help propel me up a packed snowmobile trail with
a trace of fresh snow cover.

While the entire outing can be classified as "steep", we did transition through a range of trail conditions, as shown below:

About 60% of the trail followed this pattern: an existing snowmobile track with a trace to
no snow cover. 

About 30% of the trail followed this pattern: 2-4 inches of untouched snow on an
existing packed track.

And, finally, about 10% of the outing was breaking trail in 8+ inches of untouched snow.
Uphill & deep trail breaking - that is a real Siberian workout!

Overall, an impressive climbing day (1700 feet ascended), a modest distance day (6.5 miles) and a moderate speed day (16 MPH top speed). Elevation really makes for an energetic short run!

White Christmas

Max & Zorro plowing through the powder
as we approach our finish at French
Gulch. And, yes, that is a Santa Hat on
my head! (click for a larger view)

Oh boy did Santa deliver! We got a dump of fresh snow late Christmas Eve and into this morning and we awoke to a White Christmas Treat!

No time for presents, we had to get to the trails to be the fresh tracks in all this new snow. It was worth it - we were breaking trail in 6-12 inches of fresh powder for most of the outing today! The outing had 3 sections of trail conditions:

(1) Traveling up the "Barney Ford" side of the Sally Barber Mine trail. This section was an untouched winter wonderland with us breaking trail the entire route in 6-10 inches.

(2) Traveling down the "French Gulch" side of the Sally Barber Mine trail. This section had an existing set of parallel ski tracks - darn, someone beat us to the new snow on this section of trail! Oh well, existing tracks mean "go fast", even if it is just a single set of new tracks (see the video below).

(3) Traveling out & back in French Gulch. Oh boy, no existing tracks again - breaking trail in 8-12 inches the entire route.

Clearly Max & Zorro were good boys this year as Santa delivered a real Siberian Treat for us to skijor in today.

Breaking trail uphill towards Sally Barber Mine.

Still breaking trail as we crest up to meet Sally Barber Mine. Pretty snow covered trees with blue
sky starting to break through on the horizon.

What? An existing pair of ski tracks on the down trail from Sally Barber to French Gulch!
Well, guess we'd better sprint then if we have existing tracks (even if there is still quite a bit
of powder). This is the same section of trail where we hit 24 MPH last Saturday. What a
difference a few days and 12 inches of new snow can make!
[watch on youtube if no video show below]

Back to breaking trail and laying fresh tracks in French Gulch.

Whoa - chest deep for both Max & Zorro! Wheee what a Christmas Present!!!!

Totals for today's outing: 7.1 miles, 900 feet of elevation gain, top speed of 16 MPH and breaking trail in 6-12 inches for over 5.5 of the miles! What Fun!

Season Opener!

Snow FINALLY came! Break out the boots, collect the gloves, get out the goretex, fetch the sled: SNOW IS HERE!!!

At our "break point" - Max doing his patented "snow angel" to cool off; Zorro doing
his patented "snow chug" to cool off. "Winter is here: Wheeeeee!" say Max & Zorro!

Snow came to the Colorado mountains Friday night and into Saturday. "We MUST use the snow!" exclaimed Max & Zorro - I was thrilled to try! It wasn't much, but anything white, cold and fluffy is better than the dirt of summer.

We headed up to Vail Pass this morning as the forecast called for snow in that direction. Here is what we found:

1. 2-5 inches of "first snow of the season" over a rocky and/or muddy terrain.
2. Not enough snow (given the rocks or mud just under the surface) to skijor - but plenty of snow to dog sled. So, we hooked Max & Zorro to the sled and hit the trails.

Now, remember, with just 2 huskies, the musher has to get off the sled and hike/run/sprint up steep hills. It is too much to ask them to carry me up a steep incline. So, we did a mild 7.5 miles for our first outing of the season; but WE WERE ON SNOW!!! Woo Hoo - let the season begin!

Highlight of the season... I won a GoPro in their "daily giveaway", so we have HD-quality video queued up for the upcoming skijoring season. This ought to be fun to watch...

Here is a great clip from today's video of Max & Zorro trotting at a cool 10-12 MPH pace through the fresh snow:

Now, people have often asked me "what" Max & Zorro do if we stop. Well, "stop" does NOT happen very often. But, we do stop at either the "high point" or "midway point" of all of our outings. It is usually a short 4-6 minute break (mostly to rest the human). The following video shows our typical stop point...

A few things to note:

1. The Siberians look like they haven't even started yet!
2. Max & Zorro get hot dogs at our stop points. Cute Max climbing all over the musher for his treat; polite Zorro sitting right in front of me before each of his treats.
3. Once the hot dogs are passed out: (a) Max doing his typical "snow angel" roll in the snow to cool off; (b) Zorro doing his typical "snow gulp" to ingest snow to cool his jets.

The 2012-2013 season is ON! Bring on the snow... Now, before you think it was perfect conditions, pause to see the following:

Encountering a Forest Ranger far back on the trails. "Quit crushing our trail!"

The final approach to the trailhead. YUCK - what happened to our snow!!!

Vital Stats: 7.5 miles; 900 feet of elevation gain; 16 MPH top speed. A pretty good first outing for sketchy conditions...

Breckenridge to Como

At the summit of Boreas Pass - very wind blown terrain.

The plan for the day sounded perfect - sometimes reality sucks! ;-)

We were going to start on the Breckenridge side of Boreas Pass and skijor up to the summit and then down the other side of Boreas Pass to the town of Como. This would be a 15 mile route climbing a total of 1850 feet in elevation - a fun workout for all. Skijoring from Breckenridge to Como - it sounded so perfect...

It even started perfect...

(1) The "up route" was incredible. We ascended up Boreas in about an hour and 20 minutes - 7 miles of "all up" and 1600 feet of elevation climbed. When you factor in the elevation, we were flying! Everyone was in top skijoring form!

It even started perfect on the Como side of Boreas...

(2) The first 2 miles starting down from the Boreas Summit towards Como was awesome. No existing tracks on the trail (except for the occasional fox or snowshoe hare tracks) and we were breaking trail in 8-12 inches of untouched snow for 2 miles. "This is going to be a fun, wild ride down!" I thought. Silly me...

Then disaster set in - the final 6 miles of the route to Como was a wind blown mess!

(3) Over the next 2 miles, I had to take the skis off twice and hike down as the trail had every trace of snow blown off it. We were skijoring for at most 1.5 miles of this section and hiking over exposed terrain for over 1/2 a mile. "Ugh, we want to skijor not hike!" I moaned. Little did I know...

(4) The final 4 miles to Como was horrendous! We skijored at most 2 miles in this section and had the skis off hiking over completely snowless terrain for over 2 miles. To make matters worse, it was not as simple as 2 miles of snow then 2 miles without. Instead, we had what seemed like a million short sections of snow and then short sections of no snow: repeated "on & off" of the skis and repeated hiking interruptions - never a chance to open up the "skijoring vehicle" for some downhill speed! The Como side of Boreas Pass was indeed a wind blown disaster with so much exposed terrain you would have thought it was October or May, not February.

Anyway... We did complete the entire 15 mile route with a nice 1850 feet of elevation climbed (1600 on the initial up and then 250 of occasional upswings on the way down). But, we had the skis off for about an hour of the route to hike over snowless terrain - BOO! Oh well, it was still a fun workout for all even with the extended hiking interruptions.

Vital Stats: 15 miles; 200m total time; 120m skijoring time (60m hiking time; 20m of repeated equipment "on/off" time and route planning time); 16 MPH top speed (we never had an extended down section to open up the throttle); 1850 feet of fun elevation climbed!

It was quite windy with big gusts atop Boreas Pass. Usually we stop and take
a break at the Summit. Too windy today, I just snapped a shot of the "Summit
sign" as we skied on by to get back in the cover of some trees to escape the wind.

We stopped for a quick break about 1 mile down from the Boreas Summit towards
Como. Look at this beautiful, untouched terrain in front of us! Breaking trail in
8-12 inches of snow. Little did I know we only had about 1 more mile of this pure
bliss before disaster terrain set in...

A 180 from the previous shot - looking back at our trail breaking tracks coming
down from the Summit.

At our break point - there is a squirrel in the trees in front of us. You cannot see
the small squirrel in the photo; but the "crouched hunting" posture of Max should
tell you all you need to know about what is in the trees!

Weaving through the Trees

My "4 foot tall poles" planted in the deep snow
just off the side of the trail. Only about 1 foot of
the pole is above snow.

Today's skijoring outing was an excursion on some of our "private trails" - the paths not published in any of the guides. You have to know the backcountry to know your way.

Since these are "paths less traveled", the trail was typically narrow and weaving through heavily wooded forest. About 1/2 the way the trail was "2 Huskies wide" for Max & Zorro to skijor side by side. The other 1/2 was on trails only about "1 Husky wide", so Max & Zorro had to go single file and alternated taking the lead. If you tried "side by side", then one would be off the primary trail and in 2-4 feet of snow (and, thus, unable to keep pace with the one on the trail).

The outing covered about 6.2 miles and climbed about 1250 feet, winding through the trees on Baldy Mountain. Since the trail was rarely more than "2 Huskies wide", at best, we did not hit any typical sprint speeds. This was caution by the human, the Siberians were perfectly willing to open up the throttle and sprint through the trees - the cautious human was unwilling to put the skis parallel and fly through such tight terrain...

Vital Stats: 6.2 miles; 94m total time; 84m skijoring time; 16 MPH top speed; 1250 feet of elevation gain.

We could continue on the established trail ahead, or.....

Or, we could hang a right into the deep snow off the trail and blaze our
own path following those snowshoe hare tracks just in front of us! Bunny!!!
Notice how deep the snow is in this path started by Max. The vote was 2-to-1
to "follow the Bunny tracks"; but I used my veto power to overturn this decision.

We just emerged from a "1 Husky wide" section of trail in the trees and are
resetting ourselves to "side by side" before continuing on.

Using the Snow Stilts

Today was Backcountry Exploring in up to 30+ inches of Untouched Powder!

Going single file as we all use Max's snow stilts (his long legs) to break trail!

Today's skijoring was, well, how to put it.... DEEP DEEP DEEP! Breaking trail in untouched backcountry powder up to 30 inches deep in places (I was in snow 3/4 the way up my thigh - that's 30 inches deep)!

Our goal today: start on Baldy Mountain and use "paths less traveled" to connect over to Boreas Mountain. The first 1.5 miles was well traveled trails on Baldy with 2-4 inches of powder. The next 3 miles were on non-standard trails: immediately starting in 10+ inches of untouched powder and quickly turning into 20 and then 30 inches of untouched powder! The last mile was again well traveled with 3-5 inches of powder.

3 miles of breaking trail in 10-30 inches - wow, that's a Siberian workout. As usual, once we got over 18 inches, this was too much for short Zorro to keep up side by side with tall Max. So, we switched to single file skijoring (Max, Zorro and then me) so Max's long legs could break trail and Zorro & I could glide behind the leader. Max is tall & skinny, so we always refer to his long legs as snow stilts - perfectly suited to breaking trail in extremely deep conditions.

Vital Stats: 5.6 miles; 85m total time; 65m skijoring time (20m of breaks and studying the GPS to figure out which way to proceed); 16 MPH top speed; 1100 feet of elevation gain; extremely deep & untouched powder to break trail through!

The initial transition from the well traveled trail on Baldy onto our untouched,
breaking trail route.

Still breaking trail, getting deeper...

Too deep for Zorro - single file and use the snow stilts to break trail...

From 2 to 20 inches!

Cruising up the mid section of Indiana Creek.
No tracks, breaking trail, Zorro chest deep!
Notice Max's back covered in snow - "Siberian
cooling tactic ;-)"

Sunday morning found Max, Zorro & I breaking trail in up to 20 inches of fresh, untouched powder! Woooo!

We had a couple of inches of snowfall in town Saturday night, so we decided to test the upper elevations of the Indiana Creek trail. Wow, were we in for an extreme trail breaking treat! We were fresh tracks the entire route and saw everything from 2 to 20+ inches of untouched powder:

1) First 1/4 mile: Indiana Creek winter trailhead heading up towards Boreas Pass - about 2 inches of fresh, untouched powder.

2) 1/4 - 1/2 mile: continuing up Indiana Creek - powder increasing to 2-4 inches.

3) 1/2 - 1 mile: in the lower open meadow of Indiana Creek before ascending into the trees (crossing the semi-exposed creek twice) - 4-6 inches of untouched powder.

4) 1 - 4.2 miles: ascending up the steep, heavily wooded (and rarely traveled) section of Indiana Creek to connect with Boreas Pass Rd - 8-20 inches of untouched powder. Most of the time spent breaking trail in the 12-16 inch range with occasional strings of 20+ inches to break through! Steep, Deep, Breaking Trail - Siberian power.

20+ inches - what, did I stop and put a yardstick in the snow, you ask? No, the definition of "20+ inches" is snow depth where Max & Zorro can no longer power forward with their shoulders but, instead, have to resort to "bunny hopping" (or "dolphin cresting") through the snow. An extreme workout for two fellas under 2 feet tall; but you should see the smiles as their heads with each crest above the snow!

5) 4.2 - 6.2 miles: cruising down Boreas Pass Rd in 4-6 inches of untouched powder to Bakers Tank.

6) 6.2 - 8.2 miles: continuing down Boreas Pass Rd in 2-4 inches of fresh powder.

7) 8.2 - 8.7 miles: lower, wind & sun beaten section of Boreas Pass Rd with too many exposed rocks to skijor. Shed the skis and hike over this terrain. BOOOOO!

8) 8.7 - 9.2 miles: re-engage the skis and cruise to the Boreas winter trailhead. Phew, what a workout...

Vital Stats: 9.2 miles; 140m total time, 100m skijoring time (20m hiking time, 20m stopped & equipment on/off/adjustment time); 16 MPH top speed; 1300 feet of elevation gain with 1000 of the elevation gain happening over just 3 miles breaking trail in up to 20 inches of powder!

A nice view of the untouched trail in front of us. Breaking trail in over
12 inches of powder at this point. Note Zorro's back left leg kicking out
of the snow. Siberians powering me up this deep & steep trail!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas....
Sorry, this shot of the "snow covered Christmas trees" just made me
start to sing...

Mixed Bag of Situations

On the return approach to the Boreas trailhead.
Happy, smiling, cruising Huskies!

Today's skijor outing had quite the mixed bag of situations to maneuver through. Our plan was to skijor from the Boreas Pass winter trailhead up Boreas Pass Rd to the Boreas Summit and then return the same route - a nice 13-14 mile outing. We had some fresh snow fall last night and Max, Zorro & I were the first to the trailhead today - breaking trail and laying fresh tracks in (mostly) 3-5 inches of untouched powder all the way up to the summit! But, the following 4 "situations" lead to some interesting events on our outing...

1) Situation 1: Exposed terrain
We are still waiting for that Nov/Dec storm to dump 1+ feet of snow (all at once) and pave the backcountry trails for the rest of the season. As a result, we are still skiing "storm to storm" as we get 3-5 inch teasers. Unfortunately, Boreas Pass Rd has a few exposed areas that are subject to high winds. On the way up to the summit, we encountered two long sections that were so wind blown that the snow had been completely removed from the trail (along with 4 more sections with a very light layer over sheets of ice). I had to remove the skis and hike/jog up the trail over these 2 sections. I also had to make a mental note of the "sheet of ice" sections as I'd be re-encountering these on the way down at Siberian down speed!

2) Situation 2: Snow Physics
If the wind has blown to expose or leave less than an inch on parts of the trail - well, where does that snow go? Into snowdrifts, of course. The counterpart to "situation 1" - we encountered about 6 areas of prolonged snowdrifts 8-12 inches in depth (corresponding to the 6 areas of exposed terrain and sheets of ice). Snowdrifts are, of course, extremely fun for us to skijor through; but they do introduce some extra exercise to our 14 mile outing...

3) Situation 3: Extreme Cold
It was 2 degrees outside when we left the heavily wooded trailhead. Now, factor in that we skijored up 1600 feet to terrain above treeline with increasing winds. 2 degrees + 1600 feet up + above treeline + high winds == a windchill of probably 20-30 BELOW zero at the Boreas Summit. As we crested onto the summit, I could feel the bitter cold; so we skijored past the summit and a little ways down the backside until we found a group of trees to huddle next to. This represented our "break point" and I gave Max & Zorro their skijoring hotdog rewards at this point and changed into my warmest gear (oh did those warmer gloves feel GREAT!). We do not have many pictures for today's outing primarily because of the extreme cold - the human needs to take a glove off to get pictures and the hand refused to relinquish its glove.

4) Situation 4: Equipment Issues
So, we are on the way down and I know there will be 2 sections where skis need to be removed (the same 2 sections as the way up). We get to the first section and stop to remove the skis and .... my right boot will not detach from the ski! "You've got to be kidding," I thought, "this cannot be happening!" The skis I was using were my "new" pair that I bought used at the local Nordic Ski Swap a few weeks ago. I knew one of the bindings (the one on my right ski) was in less than perfect shape; but the skis were an incredible deal and useable under initial tests/outings. Well, today was apparently too much and the binding was locked to the boot and would not release. Okay, so my right ski will not come off, the exposed terrain is not skiable - now what? Well, I removed my left ski, raised my right foot, and hopped with Max & Zorro over the bad terrain until I could restart skiing. Add up the 2 sections of "remove skis and hike - er, I mean hop" and I spent about 25 minutes navigating terrain on one leg - ow... These skis will be making a trip to the ski repair shop next week!

Despite all of these challenging situations, it was still a great fun day for the 3 of us. We hit 14 miles as our total distance (longest outing of this 2011/2012 season) and cruised at a very nice pace when both skis were on!

Vital Stats: 14 miles; 190m total time; 129m skijoring time, 15m uphill hiking without skis, 25m downhill hopping on one (now sore) leg, 21m stopped time (our mid-break and ski inspection & cursing ;-) ... 16 MPH top speed and 1600 feet of elevation gain along the outing.

One time I dared take off a glove to take a quick shot.
Not a very interesting shot, but the hand wanted back in its glove!

Second (and last) time I dared to remove a glove and snap some pictures.
A look at the structures at Boreas Summit as we ski by heading for more
cover to hide from the wind and take a break before heading back down.

Crowded Trails

Happy Huskies nearing our
finish for the day.

We are still waiting for our first "big snow" of the season to open up all the backcountry trails. As a result, the few trails that are well shaded are the only trails with adequate snow to ski. Yet, even these trails are all interrupted by exposed rocks in the sunny patches you encounter every 1-3 miles...

The Sally Barber Mine trail is one of these few, well shaded and skiable trails. But, everyone in Breckenridge knows this fact - the result: the trail is packed. Today's crowds included 5 different sets of loose & annoying dogs. Think about it people - Max & Zorro are in harness and hooked into a working setup - they DO NOT want your loose Fluffy running into the middle of their hookup! I always say, there are not stupid dogs, just stupid people. Oh well, Max & Zorro are good; we just stop and move to the side of the trail and wait for Fluffy's human to get a clue and come move Fluffy along...

Today's Route: (1) Barney Ford/Sally Barber trailhead and skijor up to Sally Barber Mine; (2) hang a right at Sally Barber Mine and connect onto the Nightmare on Baldy Trail - heading towards Baldy Mountain; (3) eventually connect with Baldy Road and skijor up to the Iowa Mill Mine; (4) take a short break and return back down Baldy Road to Nightmare on Baldy; (5) skijor down the Nightmare trail until it got too icy, narrow and steep for me to skijor comfortably (I'm not going to try to slalom between trees being propelled down a narrow, icy and steep trail!); (6) shed the skis and jog the remaining section of Nightmare back to Sally Barber Mine; (7) cruise down the Sally Barber trail towards the French Gulch trailhead - stop 5 times for loose, annoying Fluffies; (8) finish at the French Gulch trailhead.

Conditions are still very "early season" and we are still waiting for the first "big storm" of the season to open up our typical 10-15 mile trails. Pray for snow, Pray for snow, Pray for snow.....

Vital Stats: 6.2 miles; 100m total time; 60m skijoring time (15m hike/jog time; 25m stopped time - including far too many "Fluffy avoidance" stops); 16 MPH top speed; 1150 feet of elevation ascended.

Skijoring up the trails on Baldy Mountain.

Exploring the snow off the trail at the Iowa Mill Mine.

Hey Max - how deep in the snow can you bury your head?

The Iowa Mill Mine (established 1935), still semi-operational...

We're Back!!!!!

Approaching the end of our run at the French Gulch
winter trailhead. Note the large puddle just behind
me to the left - there was NO snow on this trail just
yesterday! Today had a nice cover of new snow; but a
very wet & sticky snow. Max & Zorro, with happy husky
faces, doing their best to power me through this sticky
snow to the "finish line".

On Friday I declared our 2010/2011 Skijoring Season was over unless Mother Nature wanted to offer a helping hand...

"Mother Nature - you ROCK!" we say that with our deepest appreciation - Brad, Max & Zorro.

Saturday/Sunday/Monday had us in short sleeves and shorts. Tuesday was partly cloudy, so short sleeves and jeans. Late Tuesday and into Wednesday, Mother Nature answered Max & Zorro's prayers and started dumping a May snowstorm upon us!

Wednesday morning found the 4 of us (Max, Zorro, Mother Nature & I) hitting the trails for a mid-May skijoring treat! It continued to snow during our entire outing, often hard enough to bring visibility down to a few hundred feet. The snow was a heavy, wet & sticky "spring snow" - making the outing extra exhilarating - but no complaints here. We encountered no other people or tracks on our outing - breaking trail in 2 to 6 inches of fresh, heavy powder for 9 miles! Needless to say, Max & Zorro are happily napping now and I am happily on the couch resting my burning legs!

The Route: Sally Barber winter trailhead off Sally Barber Rd; skijor up to Sally Barber Mine and then sprint down to French Gulch; hang a right onto French Gulch and cruise up the gulch to the edge of the last open meadow in the gulch; take a short break; then sprint down the gulch to the French Gulch winter trailhead.

Vital Stats: 8.8 miles; 2h 5m total time; 1h 45m moving time; 5.0 MPH moving average; 16 MPH top speed. Only a 5 MPH moving average? you ask - did I mention the conditions: heavy, wet & sticky snow gripping the skis and breaking trail in up to 6 inches of this heavy white stuff...

Cruising up the lower sections of French Gulch.
No tracks + fresh snow + falling snow = Siberian Heaven.

Tilt the camera up from the last shot. Snowing so hard that the trees down
the center of the picture almost look hazed or fogged over.

A look back at the path we skijored through the last open meadow in French Gulch.
That's not fog or low clouds making the picture hazy - that's falling snow. Woo!

Another shot capturing the snow falling around us in French Gulch.

Taking a break at the edge of the last meadow in French Gulch OR digging to
china at the edge of the last meadow in French Gulch - depends who you ask ;-)

Closing out April - Siberian Style!

About 1/2 mile from the Indiana Creek trailhead.
No tracks, breaking trail - we would not encounter
any tracks for the next 7.5 miles and we'd be breaking
trail in up to 18 inches of powder! 

What a wild April! Miles skijored in the month of April = 72.8; miles breaking trail in 6+ inches of powder = 58.2 - that means serious trail breaking exercise 80% of the month!!!


Max, Zorro & I closed out April doing a 9.6 mile tour from the Indiana Creek winter trailhead; out & up to Boreas Pass Rd; and then down to the Boreas winter trailhead. After the first 1/2 mile, we were breaking trail in 6+ inches of powder. This continued for the next 7.5 miles reaching up to 18 inches of powder at times! The last 1.5 miles had us on packed powder trails and the Siberian Engines had enough juice left in the tank to hit 16 MPH on this final sprint leg!

Highlight of the outing: NO DUCKS. When a typical cross country skier encounters steep or steep-and-deep uphill terrain, the skiing form is to fan your ski tips outward and do a "duck walk" like motion to propel yourself upward without slipping downhill. Max, Zorro & I have an agreement: I will never "duck walk" - all steep and steep/deep uphill terrain will be conquered with parallel skis and pure Siberian power...

In the upper portion of Indiana Creek we hit a steep section of trail where the powder was deeper than Zorro's shoulders (about 18 inches or so) and extends on a very serious grade for about 100 yards. A few yards into this section and I felt my skis slipping backward and saw Max & Zorro starting to slide backwards as well. No Duck Walking!!! I planted my ski poles to anchor us and called out to Max, "Ok Max, let's go - come on, forward, let's go!" Max is the lead dog in our configuration (e.g., the listener) and Max is also the stronger of the two. Zorro, though, has no backdown in his personality, if he sees Max exerting himself he is going to try and "one up" him - thus giving us a powerful V8 engine combining the 2 of them.... Lift my poles a little and feel the backward slip starting again... "Let's go Max - come on Max, let's go Zorro" - see Max plant his legs, lean forward with his shoulders and feel a forward slide... Zorro immediately tries to "one up" Max and I feel a little more forward slide. "Woooo, good forward Max, good forward Zorro!" We then proceed to power up this 100 yard steep incline while breaking trail in 18ish inches of powder and my skis remain parallel! Woo Hoo! What Siberian Power!

We had about 3 episodes like the one above - steep inclines that normally cause us no problems on this trail, but throw in 12-18 inches of powder and we needed some real Siberian energy to power up these inclines with the human's skis remaining parallel (and apt to slide backwards at the slightest loss of momentum). What good boys! It is moments like these that have me addicted to skijoring with Max and Zorro.

Vital Stats: 9.6 miles; 2h 25m total time; 2h moving time; 4.8 MPH moving average; 16 MPH top speed; 1300 feet of elevation gain (and loss); breaking trail in up to 18 inches of powder!

On Boreas Pass Rd - a look back at the trail we ascended out of
Indiana Creek to connect with Boreas.

On Boreas Pass Rd - looking at the direction we will break trail down.
You cannot see it, but there really is a trail Max & Zorro know how to
follow. It was head down and skijoring straight into a growing wind
and increasing snow for the next 1-2 miles until we got back into the
protection of trees.

Max & Zorro sharing a snowcone before we start down Boreas Pass Rd.