Late April Freshies

Laying fresh tracks as we descend out of the backcountry and onto Boreas Pass Rd at Bakers Tank.

What beautiful, untouched terrain in front of us - wheeee!

If you paid close attention to our last six skijor outings, you should have noticed a common denominator on 5 of the 6 outings - Pass... Rabbit Ears Pass, Vail Pass and (today) Boreas Pass. While conditions may be deteriorating at lower elevations, the season is still alive and well when you hang around the upper elevation passes.

Today's "pass" was Boreas Pass. The trailhead to Boreas Pass is extremely popular and had been tracked and melted down to dirt and mud. So, we needed a way to get onto the upper parts of Boreas without using the published entrance. Luckily, we know of a few secret ways to approach Boreas from the backcountry and bypass the lower, broken section of trail. The secrets were a success:

Laying fresh tracks in 4-8 inches of untouched powder on our secret approaches to Boreas.
What a fun backcountry tour!

Eventually we transitioned onto Boreas at Bakers Tank (as shown in the first photo). We then had fun following a set snowshoe track up & down parts of Boreas before taking another secret way off of Boreas to end the day (and, again, bypass the broken lower terrain):

Enjoying a gentle jog along the snowshoe trail on Boreas Pass Rd.

Temperatures were below freezing, but barely....

"Must cool our jets by rolling snow angels before continuing!" declare the snow angel rolling
pair at our quick midpoint break of the day.

What a late April treat: laying fresh tracks using secret trails to get on & off Boreas and then jogging along the set tracks of Boreas. 8 miles with 900 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 15 MPH.

2014/2015 Season to Date: 131 days on the trails covering 1130.6 miles with 118,700 feet of elevation climbed.

Vail Pass Uncorked

It was "pedal to the metal" all day as we uncorked the skijoring engine on perfect conditions at Vail Pass!

Flying along the hard crust in one of the many open meadows around Shrine Pass.

There was about 1/4 to 1/2 inch of new snow on Vail Pass and the "Spring crust" in all of the open meadows is still strong enough to hold a Siberian Husky. As a result, we were sprinting all day on trail, off trail and just about everywhere up, down and around the Shrine Pass area at Vail Pass!

The first photo is "off trail" sprinting while the following is "on trail" as the layer of new snow gave me enough control on the skis to let Max & Zorro keep it full throttle all day - wheeee!

Zoom! Beautiful form shot of Zorro as I am directly behind Max and able to catch this
nice side view of the Sprinting Z.

Today's video highlight is just what you would expect from the title of today's blog... Zoom we go flying along the terrain atop Shrine Pass. About 25-30 seconds or so into the video is where we hit the day's top speed of 23 MPH.

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Nothing like perfect conditions for a late April sprint run!

"What a great day & perfect conditions to 'open it up'!" declare the happy pair looking back
at me at our turnaround point atop Shrine Pass.

Zoom: 9.1 miles with 900 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 23 MPH.

2014/2015 Season to Date: 130 days on the trails covering 1122.6 miles with 117,800 feet of elevation climbed.

Hidden Gem

Skijoring one of our favorite "hidden gem" trails near home this morning - zoom:

Fully out-stretched sled dogs towing me up a rise in the trail.
So fun to get towed uphill!!!

The network of trails we used this morning are some of the gems that stay ski-able the longest into Spring. Two reasons they stay in good shape so long: (1) you are above 11,000 feet elevation on most of the terrain; and (2) they are seldom used (and, thus, not "tracked down") by others. Come along for our tour of the hidden gem trails:

The real trail is the footsteps you see to our left; but the trail gets more sun and some traffic.
The right shoulder is about 3 feet above the trail (3 feet of snowpack!) and hard enough for us
to glide along on the side! "Nice up here on the shoulder, huh bro?" whispers Max to Zorro
as we cruise along the terrain.

A lot of this terrain weaves you through dense forests. The snowpack was fine, but you have to be careful near large trees as their branches block snow from collecting at the base...

Zooming through the forest, just stay away from the dirt spots near the tall or dense trees.

A few nice open straightaways to open things up - wheeee:

Wide open straightaway - pedal to the metal!

Unfortunately I had to take the skis off once to cross over a large patch of dirt in the trail. As long as I cross quickly and get the skis back on quickly, my partners are quite agreeable and understand the conditions:

"Having a great day; but get those skis back on quickly..." declare the happy pair looking back
at me as I place my ski down to get me ready to restart the proper pace.

A great day cruising around the forest on one of our hidden gem trails: 7.7 miles with 1050 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 18 MPH.

2014/2015 Season to Date: 129 days on the trails covering 1113.5 miles with 116,900 feet of elevation climbed.