Nothing was going to top Tuesday’s mega-miler for its epic value, but that doesn’t mean I stop riding when there is plenty of it still to be done.
Crazy Cal decided to roll the dice and join me on Wednesday. We did the “C8 bypass” meaning that we trailered to Browns Farm parking lot and started from there. We figured it would extend our range of riding different territory by not going through the C8 meat grinder from Indian Lake to Headquarters. Few things are more demoralizing than even the thought of tackling 18 miles of used and abused goat-path at the end of a long ride.
When we launched before 9am, the trail from the end of Cedar River Road to Headquarters was amazing and it looked like mid-winter. Heck, there was even snow on Cedar River Road! It was a beautiful sight at Headquarters:
From Headquarters to Silver Run as a solid good ride, ranging from nearly smooth to small, soft bumps.
Inlet side of Moose River Plains? Bumpy as *#@&^! with legitimate whopping moguls. It sucked BADLY until we encountered the Inlet groomer past the Red River T.
Inlet loop trails were groomed for a great ride. Ole Barn into downtown Inlet was a snirt streak, but at least it was flat.
Hopped onto 4th Lake and ripped it across to Daikers. From there, Trail 5 was brown, but at least it was plush and almost flat. Trail 9 and 29 were OK at best, bumpy in places. Trail 2 and 1 were pretty good riding.
Here’s one of our trail-side rest stops:
By mid-day, temperatures had risen well above 32*F and the winter luster had began to vanish.
On to Brantingham…
We saw fresh groomer tracks onto the Brantingham Trail and was encouraged for a rare good ride through that avenue. But the groomer had turned around about half-way through and the second half of the trail was a bumpy torture chamber – just awful….
10 Mile Road was brown, but FLAT. Thank goodness! The 4 miles of plowed road had just enough wet slime to slide through.
C7B to Kovach was fast, flat and brown.
Partridgeville Road into Brantingham was grubby, but enough wet skank to slither through.
Had lunch at the Pine Tree Inn. I ordered nachos and a burger. Almost wish the waitress had told me how big the pile of nachos were. But I was up the challenge and polished off both:
Going for the loop…
After lunch, we ran C8B down to Lyons Falls. A lot of brown snow and skanky roadside riding down that stretch. But there were some white in there too.
After we refueled at Stewarts, I had planned on taking C7B up into Turin then arc down to Constableville and Boonville. But I instead, I got spun around and ended up running C8C down to Port Leyden and eventually back into the Adirondack Park.
While it was good to learn a new trail I’ve never ridden before, many sections of C8C was bumpy as *#@&^! and featured a lot of skanky roadside riding. This was one of the smoother sections:
We were very happy to make it to C7C, which was eventually where I wanted to land anyway. It was a decent ride toward Forestport:
C7C/Brandy Lake trail was OK riding at best with a lot of brown stretches.
C7/Railroad absolutely SUCKED! Plenty of snow to cover the rails, but rough as a corn cob…
THANK GOODNESS Trail 6 proved to be a good rip up to Thendara because we need that badly. But it was rather brown in places.
Once back into Old Forge, we didn’t find much bump-free riding. The best we could find was on Trail 8 and the short rip on Trail 5 to the pits from the steel bridge.
This doesn’t do justice as to how brown Trail 5 was by late afternoon. But here it goes:
The way home….
Of course, Inlet trails were “snirtier” after afternoon temperatures had reached past 40*F and the stretch through downtown to Ole Barn was not much more than a brown smear.
Moose River Plains was a fun rip across. Inlet’s side was the smoothest, especially until the Big-T flats.
By the end of this ride, we were very happy to avoid bumping and grinding C8 all the way back to Indian Lake and end the ride on a happy note. Just loaded our sleds back onto the trailer and headed for home…
We managed 175 miles, with no desire the pad the extra 25 miles to eke out the “mega-miler”. Enough of the riding was good enough to make the day worth it. But large sections of the ride sucked too. But hey, it’s better than rotting away at work or suffering through a 90 degree summer day.
In a common theme this winter, there was higher than usual mid-week traffic. We were certainly not alone on the trails.
Outlook
Wednesday evening’s mild temperatures and sporadic rain are doing us no favors. But the snow pack remains deep. Thursday’s hard freeze will stop the bleeding and allow groomers the opportunity to salvage the trails prior to the weekend.
However, warmish temperatures are expected to return over the weekend.
Reminder…
The upcoming Snowarriors Meet and Greet at the Lewey Lake campsite beach has been moved to Saturday, February 27th, scheduled to start at NOON. This will feature an ice carousel:
This carousel won’t build itself. The Snowarriors are asking for help. Volunteers (no experience necessary) are needed on Friday, February 26th. starting at NOON. If you have a chainsaw, please bring it. In addition, on Saturday, help is needed setting up the fire pit (anyone got firewood and a way to transport it out onto the lake?), the hot dog heater, the hot chocolate.
For the ilsnow nation,
Darrin
This report is brought to you by Progressive Motorsports, celebrating their 28th year. They live, eat and breathe snowmobiling. Stop in today and see for yourself! Be sure to tell Karen that Darrin @ ilsnow.com sent ya.
