Baldy Shade

Zipping along in a 1/2 inch or so of new snow on the Sallie Barber Mine Trail this morning.

Off we go to start the outing - wheeee!

Despite being out well after sunrise this morning, we spent almost the entire outing in the shade of Baldy Mountain (which houses the Sallie Barber Mine) with the rising sun still behind the mountain. As a result, we have a lot of "low light" photos from today's fun outing.

As is typical with Jack & Rudy on our Sallie Barber outings, we start with a steep climb to the historic mine and then pause to roll snow angels to cool off before restarting again. Silly kids.

"Rub a dub dub, cooling our jets!' goes the snow rolling sillies with
Sallie Barber Mine in the background.

We made 3 passes by the mine this morning to put together a 9 mile skijor. On the final pass, the sun was almost above the shade of Baldy Mountain, but not quite yet...

The sun has risen over Baldy to light up the mine but not high enough
to light up the trail yet.

Come along for the video counterpart to the prior photo. The clip starts as we have just crested on the trail at the mine. Watch as we zip on by the mine with ok lighting but then immediately are back in low light from the shade of Baldy Mountain as we floor it down the other side of the mine. Wheeee!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Then, onto one of our favorite open straightaways to floor it on this network of trails and Jack & Rudy decided to "pack it in tight" and become a single, conjoined skijoring machine :)

The fused together while running fast fun kids.

Finally, back to the trailhead and apparently I was being too slow getting the end of run treats bag open:

"You need some help there?" says Jack offering to open the bag :)
"Yeah, what's the hold up?" asks curious Rudy.

A fun morning making three passes by the Sallie Barber Mine to put together a 9.2 mile outing with 1000 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 22 MPH.

2023/2024 Season to Date: 69 days on the trails covering 585.4 miles with 57,100 feet of elevation climbed.

 

Dunk

Fun shot from the front as the happy sled dogs tow me to the finish on the Harrison Creek Trail at Rabbit Ears Pass.

Wheeee - riding the Siberian Three!

Harrison Creek is our favorite early & late season trail at Rabbit Ears as it always has the best early/late snow. The reason is that this trail is heavily shaded at the beginning and rises quickly in elevation before breaking out of the trees. Shade at the start makes for great early season snow.

Mid winter looking in the shade at the start of the morning's run!

After rising quickly in the shade, the trail opens up at high enough elevations that the temperatures are cold enough to preserve the snow, even in the sun. Such a pretty trail once you get into the open:

Beautiful up high. Love this shot of out-stretched Zorro & Rudy on each side of sprint-tucked Jack. Zoom!

A very rewarding climb to get up high, right guys?

"Well worth the work to get here!" declares the happy trio.

How nice up high? Well come along for today's short video clip showcasing the great upper elevation terrain on Harrison Creek:

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Eventually we had to turn around and everyone wanted to go play in the side powder first. At first I though Zorro was going to roll a snow angel with the kids; but, instead, he led them into a synchronized head dunk.

DUNK!!! It must smell delicious under the snow! 

Oh, don't worry, Jack & Rudy did roll snow angels too; they simply joined Zorro in the synchronized head dunk first :)

If you tow the human, you get end of run treats - my partners know that :)

"Dish them out!" states the focused trio.

A great early season day on Harrison Creek as we await the new snow forecast this week to re-open all of our trails! 6.2 miles traveled with 800 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 19 MPH.

2019/2020 Season to Date: 20 days on the trails covering 122.2 miles with 12,650 feet of elevation climbed.

Creativity

Celebrating a successful, albeit creative, skijor in the backcountry this morning!

"We had a GREAT time, now how about those end-of-run treats?!?" says the happy & focused trio.

With the warm & dry start to November we are limited to well shaded trails to continue our skijoring until the next storm arrives.  There is a steep set of mountain biking trails that start close to the town of Breckenridge and take you up quickly into some heavily shaded terrain. We decided to let the youngsters (Jack & Rudy) tow me up this shaded incline this morning.

Nice snow coverage (although narrow & heavily packed) as we ride up & out of town.

Since the trails are so close to town, they are heavily used so pretty packed & slick in places. So, we could go UP these trails but I would certainly die trying to come DOWN them behind 2 or 3 fast sled dogs :)

So the plan was to let the youngsters tow me up and eventually we would meet up with Zorro & Nancy and continue to skijor the much less steep but still heavily shaded backside of Sally Barber Mine. Zorro joined in, everyone ready to go?

"Yes!!!!" exclaims the happy trio.

Once we had Zorro in team, we did an out & back on the shady side of Sally Barber. Unfortunately you run out of safely shaded terrain after just under 1.25 miles. So it was a fast out & back with Zorro and, thus, the reason we did a steep climb to exercise the youngsters first. Although short, this section of trail is still in fantastic condition. If you look closely, there are two packed tracks on the trail with shallow powder in between. Each track is only "2 Siberians wide" so we spent most of the outing on Sally Barber with skinny Zorro & Jack sharing one track and big, husky Rudy running his own track.

Great shot of the "sprint tucked trio" as we fly along a perfect trail!

Time to turn around and....

"Please tell me they did SOMETHING other than this before I joined!" states Zorro.
"We are the snow rolling goof twins!" declares Jack & Rudy.

Yes, Zorro, the kids really did tow me up the mountain; but the most fun was when we added you into the team! Come along for a glimpse of the fun to be had on the backside of Sally Barber.

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Finally, winding out the day with the happy trio towing me to the trailhead.

"So happy to be towing the human!" demonstrates the sled dog trio.

A steep start with Jack & Rudy and then a short & mellow out & back with Zorro, Jack and Rudy: 6.5 miles traveled with 900 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 19 MPH.

2019/2020 Season to Date: 17 days on the trails covering 102.6 miles with 10,350 feet of elevation climbed.

Shade

Yay for the shade on the lower section of the Middle Fork Trail in Swan Valley!

Great November 5th conditions as we started the day in the shade on the Middle Fork
Trail in Swan Valley!

Boo for the melting in the sun exposed sections of the Middle Fork Trail:

Yikes! Barely enough snow to keep the skis on! Luckily my partners know to slow to a
trot when conditions are sketchy! 

Although we had some great snow to end October, we have had a warm & dry start to November. I was wracking my brain yesterday trying to think of a trail that may have survived the last few warm days. What we needed was a trail with lower elevation shade so the snow would still be intact as we climbed elevation to where the snow is still extremely good. The decision was to try the Middle or South Fork trails at Swan Valley this morning. As you see in the first photo, Middle Fork had the perfect amount of shade to start our run. As you see in the second photo, it was sketchy whenever we encountered sun exposed sections of trail.

Then, once we got up in elevation a bit, it was as I expected - great upper elevation snow! The only drawback was the trail had been driven by 4WD vehicles, so it was a bit tracked up and tested all of my ski abilities to stay upright behind my sprinting trio :)

Great snow in the upper elevations as I am riding the skis in the track behind Jack while
Zorro & Rudy run in the tracks to the left.

How great was the lower shade? Well come along for the start to this morning's run as I am riding the "sled dog tow rope" up the Middle Fork Trail on perfect conditions in the shade.

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

I had to take my skis off once to walk over a stretch of exposed ground. Once back on snow I stopped to put the skis back on. Did I say "stopped"? Well, you know what that means from the youngsters...

"Back on snow, I'll wait for you to get in the skis!' says happy & polite Zorro.
"Stopped = rolling in snow!' demonstrates Rudy.
"Rolling AND eating snowcones - I'm talented!" adds snow rolling & eating Jack.

A perfect early November outing with just enough shade to enjoy the snow and not too much sun exposed terrain to hike over. A well earned set of end of run treats:

"Perfect! Hand out the treats!" says the happy & focused trio.

A great choice of trail this morning to get in a short fun run on what snow is still available in the shade and upper elevations: 5.2 miles traveled with 600 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 18 MPH.

2019/2020 Season to Date: 15 days on the trails covering 89.9 miles with 8850 feet of elevation climbed.