Downed Tree Obstacles

Fun Jack & Rudy running on by two skiers with their smart phones out to record the impressive sled dogs towing the crazy human on skis along the trail :)

"Coming through! Glad you are enjoying the show!" says Jack & Rudy to the
skiers who pulled out their phones to video us as we approached and glided on by.

But, wait, what is that ahead of us across the trail? Is that a tree? Well, YES it is. For context: Wednesday night, all of Thursday and into Friday morning was RIDICULOUSLY windy here in Breckenridge. Power was out for roughly 24 hours, trees were blown down all over the place and the top wind gust was recorded at 113 MPH!!!!! So, that meant we had a lot of downed trees to navigate amidst on this morning's skijor outing. Come along and see...

We had small trees across the trail that I could ski over cautiously. Jack & Rudy would hop over then wait for me on my verbal command and then take off once I was over and gave a verbal release.

Yes, I can ski over a tree this size if going slowly. But, Jack & Rudy listen
and obey perfectly so these small trees were all passable.

We had to slow so I could duck or crouch under downed trees shorter than me across the trail. Again, Jack & Rudy could fit just fine, but they listen perfectly to me to slow while I crouch or duck to try and glide through.

Approaching two trees hanging across the trail. Jack & Rudy could trot
through just fine but I had to crouch to fit. A few steps after this photo and
the camera was pointing down to the ground while I crouched.

We also had to navigate through narrow openings to fit past down trees too tall to ski over but with just enough room to squeak around.

Can't ski over this one, so slow a bit and drift to the right to squeeze through
the narrow opening my skis will slide through.

Now let's put it all together in today's video highlight. Come along as this clip starts rounding a corner into one of our favorite fast straightaways. But, then, as we pass the two skiers taking videos of us on their phones, we come across one small downed tree. Watch as Jack & Rudy hop over then gently wait me to ski over. Next we have to slow while I crouch under a tree across the trail. Then we have to swing right to go around another downed tree. Finally, we come to a stop where the trail is impassible (and you'll see a trail worker with a chainsaw out working to clear the downed trees).

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

I stopped the video as we got to what looked impassible at first sight. We paused and talked to the trail worker who was clearing this large collection of trees with a chainsaw. Then, we saw that we could step up and off trail to ski around this big obstacle too. Despite all the downed tree obstacles we encountered this morning, I was surprisingly able to keep my skis on the entire way and navigate over, under and around every obstacle. Jack & Rudy are such great listening pals!!!

Back to the trailhead for end of run treats. Despite a ton of tree obstacles, who had a fun time today?

"We did! We did! Obstacles are fun too! We love to skijor!" says the happy,
happy kids atop a small snow wall to receive their treats.

A short, but very entertaining and technical outing amidst trees, trees, everywhere: 4.1 miles traveled with 400 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 18 MPH (we never had a stretch open long enough to top this speed).

2025/2026 Season to Date: 13 days on the trails covering 78.2 miles with 9400 feet of elevation climbed.

Wind

Cruising by the historic Sallie Barber Mine on this morning's skijor.

Zipping on by - wheeee!

The prior photo is about the cleanest I footage I have from the entire outing this morning. What do I mean by that? Well, it has been ridiculously windy across just about the whole state of Colorado starting yesterday, through last night and into (and through) today! Come along to see the "wind impact" on this morning's skijor outing.

To begin with, we started our skijor on the road leading to the trailhead due to a downed tree across the road. This wasn't really a problem as the road was snow covered (albeit very hard packed); but it made for an interesting start to the outing:

Starting the skijor on the road to the trailhead because of a downed
tree across the road behind us.

The real impact, though, was downed trees on the trails. Take a look at this interesting obstacle to get by. In this case we had to dip down into the deep snow off trail to the left, go around the trees and then come back up onto the trail. This was easy for Jack & Rudy to do; but you try it on skis!!!!

Uh-oh, trail completely blocked by downed trees!

A little further along and more downed trees; but at least this one hit a tree on the other side of the trail and has a gap to the right that I can fit under!

Slow down, move to the right and DUCK :)

Total tree obstacles for this morning's short outing: 5 - 1 blocking the road to the trailhead, 2 blocking the entire trail (requiring us to dip off trail in deep snow to get around) and 2 crossing the trail but with enough clearance for me to duck under.

Even when the trail was clear of downed trees, it was littered with wind-blow tree debris!

A nice open stretch as Jack & Rudy are catching air but notice
all the wind-blown tree debris on the trail.

Today's video highlight is, of course, Tree Debris Skijoring! Come along and watch as we are still able to open up the throttle but there sure is a lot of tree debris to navigate around and slow my skis!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Despite a day of tree debris and downed trees, a great time was still had by all!

"We still had a blast!" declares the happy kids.

I mentioned two of the impacts of the ridiculous wind: downed trees and tree debris littered trails. The third impact? Well, the wind chill was approaching -20 F (yes, 20 degrees BELOW zero). As a result, the wimpy human cut the outing short this morning: 5.2 miles traveled with 400 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 20 MPH.

2023/2024 Season to Date: 60 days on the trails covering 507.3 miles with 48,500 feet of elevation climbed.

 

Downed Trees

 Rudy can taste the end of run treats before I even handed them out :)

"Slurp! I know what's coming!" demonstrates silly slurping Rudy.
"Ready, hand them out!" adds focused Zorro & Jack.

The morning started out perfect as we had a light layer of fresh snow on the trails with light snow continuing to fall. As we approached one of our favorite backcountry meadows, I was thinking what a perfect day this was turning out to be!

Perfect conditions as we approach this vast backcountry meadow.

But, everything changed once we got deeper into the forest. We had a severe windstorm last Wednesday night and Thursday morning. The trails we were on today are lightly used in the backcountry. As a result, they are far down the list of trails for the county to take care of after heavy winds. We encountered 11 downed trees during our outing that each required some form of creative crossing over or around.

I had to stop to study and evaluate our options with many of the trees. Well, stopped...

"You study, we'll roll!" demonstrates the 'stop, drop & roll' brothers :)

Some of the trees had a natural crossing point. So, I only needed to tell Jack where to look and he would lead us over:

Good Jack leading us over the tree. Polite Jack & Rudy both waited patiently
for me on the other side of the tree to step over sideways in my skis.

For a while, it seemed like every time we just started to "get going" we'd encounter yet another tree. Come along for today's short video highlight as we just started "getting going" on the trail when we have to stop for yet another downed tree!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Despite the prior video, we did have quite a few extended openings between downed trees to get in some serious skijoring:

Zooming along without a downed tree in sight! Yay!

An interesting day full of backcountry downed tree obstacles: 8.1 miles traveled with 700 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 19 MPH.

2020/2021 Season to Date: 59 days on the trails covering 464.8 miles with 41,200 feet of elevation climbed.

Debris

 A moment of unauthorized play from the 2 three years olds this morning:

"We authorize 'tag & tackle'!" suggests the young goofballs starting a game of
tag while I am navigating a corner in the trail.

Note all the pine needles you see in the prior photo. Well, it was EXTREMELY windy last night and this morning. That lead to a lot of wind blown tree debris on the trail. For the most part, it was just pine needles, small twigs and pinecones. But, we did hit the occasional patch of extreme debris:

Lots of debris across the entire trail here. Jack & Rudy are flying through just
fine; but I'm trying to pick the path of least resistance through this debris.

Despite picking the best path I could, my skis did make a not good/not normal scraping sound through the patch. Good boys Jack & Rudy simultaneously slowed, looked back to check on me and then refocused back to the front once they saw I was ok and my skis went back to normal sounds. I love their concern!

"You ok back there?" asks the wonderful partners concerned about me!

Now for the video counterpart of the prior two photos. As we start, you see the debris is minimal and we are able to fly along the trail as normal. But, the clip ends with us hitting and going through the extreme debris shown in the prior two photos. I love seeing the two kids simultaneously checking on me when the skis hit this patch. Check on the human, all is fine so go, go, go again :)

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

We had a fun "back and forth" outing this morning. We did a skijor lap on the fast & wide Sally Barber Mine Trail, then a technical lap on the narrow Trail of Tears, then another Sally Barber lap, then another Trail of Tears lap and then a final Sally Barber lap to finish the day. A nice back & forth from wide to narrow trails:

Cruising along the narrow Trail of Tears single track.

In additional the the occasional patches of extreme debris on the trail, we also encountered four downed trees. 2 we were all able to go under, 1 we were able to cautiously step over and 1 required us to go off trail to find a way around the tree. Time to go under? Ok, let's get behind lead dog Jack and off we go:

Jack leading us under the downed tree. Rudy following nicely. I was able
to crouch slightly and make it through too!

Done for the day, time to join up with elder Zorro - yay! 

"Ready!" declares the focused trio!

A fun "back & forth" outing with a lot of technical challenges for Jack & Rudy to perfectly navigate! 7.7 miles traveled with 800 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 20 MPH.

2020/2021 Season to Date: 57 days on the trails covering 447.4 miles with 39,500 feet of elevation climbed.

Impressive

 "Made you smile!" as we cruise by a skier coming up the trail beside us :)

Besides smiling, he also said, "Wow, that is cool!" as we smiled
at him while cruising on by.

Remember I mentioned yesterday that it was a very windy day? How windy? Well here's one piece of evidence:

Uh-oh, wind blown downed tree across the trail!
"Uh oh indeed!" says Jack looking back for guidance!

Over the course of this morning's outing, we encountered TEN (10) downed trees across the trail from yesterday's extreme winds. That is a record for us from one day of wind! Some trees were so large that we simply turned around to take different trails. Other trees, like the one above, were small enough for me to take off my skis, hop over, re-attach the skis and then restart. But, wait, did I say "re-attach" the skis? Yes, and you must be stopped to re-attach. So, you know what that means:

Re-attach = stop = Jack & Rudy roll snow angels :)
Where does Jack end and Rudy start? Your guess is as good a mine.

Then, there were the occasional downed trees that had one little window of skiable crosssing:

Jack & Rudy crossing this downed tree at the ONLY point where
there is enough snow for me to ski over too! Impressive!

Just how impressive is the prior photo? Well, let's put it to video to show the incredible skills of Jack and Rudy. Come along as we are flying along the trail until we approach a downed tree. All it takes from me is to utter "over the left" and then "easy, easy" for Jack & Rudy to move to a safe place for my skis to gently glide over the tree. Once we are all over, it is petal to the medal again. Such impressive listening and execution!!!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Nothing could make me prouder than the prior video. Consider that Jack & Rudy are only 3 and 2 years old; yet they are already perfect "listen and execute" sled dogs. The skill at which they skijor does not get much more impressive than this!

Finally, what to do when the trail was clear of downed trees? Floor it as we hit our fastest speed of this early season this morning: 22 MPH. Pretty good for "early season conditions!"

Our first synchronized "hover husky" of the season as it takes
real synchronicity with your brother to top 22 MPH!

Today's fun parting shot: frisky Zorro! We got back to the trailhead to meet up with Nancy and Zorro. Once Zorro joined us, he had a friskiness about him and wanted to jog around the parking lot a few times before getting our end of run treats. Go Z Go!

"Whoa, wait up big bro!" says Rudy surprised by elder Zorro's burst.
Go Z Go!

What a great day to showcase young Jack and Rudy's perfect sled dog "listen and execute" skills! 8.6 miles traveled with 900 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 22 MPH.

2020/2021 Season to Date: 8 days on the trails covering 55.4 miles with 5400 feet of elevation climbed.