Monday Evening Grooming 1/30/2012

Trails were regroomed tonight. The burn area is definitely having some issues due to all of the debris and black soot in the snow, so be very careful in there and know that down toward Point A, there are actually bare patches now, on both the upper trail and the lower road. They're not very long and can be "portaged" pretty quickly. One could ski up to the bare patches, take skis off, take a few steps and put skis back on, and repeat, about 3 or 4 times, then be on continuous snow the rest of the way.

In the past, I've used "skins" on the bottoms of my skis and just cruised up the hill and across the bare patches until I was beyond them, then took them off and skied the rest of the system. Once I was done and headed out, I put them back on and cruised back down to the car...not a big deal and it was quick and easy and a good way to warm up and cool down. Otherwise, one could just hike beside the ice on the front hill to just beyond Point A and then put on the skis.

Anyway, I ground up the skate lane nicely and left the classic track the way it is for now. I did reset the track out in the upper meadow because there was some nice soft snow and a track would set nicely. It had been destroyed from the weekend multi-use traffic and some drifting. It should ski well the rest of the week. Watch out for some ice around "the Rock" below Point J.

I also groomed the lower cutoffs as much as I could. They take extra loops to get groomed, so they don't always get the attention that the other trails do. They look great at the moment, though.

Lastly, a group of inconsiderate hikers with multiple dogs had hiked the entire trail system when it was somewhat warm, inflicting considerable damage to the trails, especially with our dearth of snow and dry winter pattern. It took more passes than usual to clean the system up (more equipment wear and tear, more gas, more of our volunteer hours, etc...), and it is still evident. That is a serious bummer. I have to admit, it makes me lose a little motivation when I see that. We're desperately short on grooming volunteers, so the conditions will suffer even more from stuff like that...

Hopefully, we'll see some new snow later this week. We need it!