Happy kids towing me to the finish of this morning's skijor outing.
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| Not the best lighting but you can still see the smiles on Jack & Rudy as they tow me to the finish. |
Today's skijor review comes along with a little history. We started the day on snowmobile trails winding through the backcountry. Along the way we passed through the ghost town of Dry Gulch from the mining days in and around Breckenridge in the 1800s and early 1900s.
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| Zipping through a ghost town. All of these structures are over 150 years old and in various states of decay. |
History: Dry Gulch was actually one of the richest mining tracts in the history of Breckenridge. As a result, the forest is littered with tons of old mines and cabins. Most are very decayed, the photo above is one of the better preserved parts of Dry Gulch as some repairs and stabilization has been made to these particular structures.
Back to skijoring. We spent the majority of the morning in the shade of a mountain to the east of us hiding the rising morning sun. But, as we wound down the outing, it was finally time for the sun to rise over the mountain and start to decorate the trail.
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| Zipping along as the sun has finally risen over the mountains to shine on the trail. |
Today's neat skijor clip goes along with the "mountain shade" versus "rising sun". We start out in the morning shade of a mountain behind us. Then, watch as we are out running the mountain and the lighting gets brighter and brighter until we finally get into the bright, bright morning sun. Wheeee! A little more history - watch to our right around 40 to 55 seconds into the clip. The large structure to the right is the historic Jessie Mine & Mill - quite large and more evidence of just how rich Dry Gulch was in the mining heydays.
[watch on youtube if no video loads below]
Now onto the comedians, Jack & Rudy. At one point we came to a three way trail junction. I paused to check our time on the trail to see if we needed to go right (towards the trailhead), left (add a bunch more distance) or straight (add a little more distance). Well, you know Jack & Rudy and pausing. But, this was Rudy's second performance of his new act: Stop, Drop, Roll and WOOOO!
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| Jack doing his patented Stop, Drop & Roll. Rudy followed suit with a Stop, Drop & Roll but then came out of the roll into a beautiful WOO - his new thing: Stop, Drop, Roll & Woo. |
Back to the trailhead and the fun kids really love finding snow walls to climb for end of run treats:
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| "We'll climb up to you for the treats!" declares the polite kids allowing me to hand them out from a standing position. |
Fun morning with a little history along the way: 8.4 miles traveled with 700 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 22 MPH.
2023/2024 Season to Date: 41 days on the trails covering 341.6 miles with 32,300 feet of elevation climbed.
