Normally, I wouldn’t even take a flyer on weekend snowmobile riding. But desperate times call for desperate measures, especially since I’m pushing toward the end of January with only 26 miles spun off for the entire winter.
It was time to pick myself off the mat and get moving. After all, I’ve got all summer to sit on the couch!
The plan was for the Indian Lake Lost Boyz to meet up at 10am. I decided to start riding a little earlier, just to rip off a victory lap around town.
The early signs were encouraging with C8 enjoying a recent Sunday morning groom.
The loop around town was in pretty decent shape. Just the occasional carbide clank and weekend worn spots. Adirondack Lake was a good rip.
Heading out
After meeting up, we headed toward Perkins Clearing. C8/Sabael trail was a decent ride with occasional carbide clank. Indian Lake was a nice ride, with minimal slush. Campsites were bumpy, but that’s to be expected. Lewey Lake had some frozen slush on it.
C8/Two Miles From Hell was chewed up and horribly rough – like “old school Two Miles from Hell”. Looked as haggardly as Lindsay Lohan after a 3 day coke binge. I was sure to use “Trail 30” to bypass some of that horror.
Perkins Clearing Road had weekend bumps, but was light-years better than the Two Miles from Hell. Jessup River Road was similar in condition to Perkins Clearing Road. To pad on some miles, we did the counterclockwise loop via Carpenter Hill Road and Mud Lake Road, which was smoothest stretch in Perkins Clearing by far.
Damion told us that C4/Melody Lodge trail down to Speculator was even worse than 2 Miles From Hell when he rode it on Saturday. So, we avoided that…
C4/C8 Big Brook trail was recently groomed for a decent ride all the way down to the Outhouse. Aside from occasional carbide clank, it was about as good as I could have expected.
Similar conditions continued on C4/Fawn Lake trail down to Sacandaga Lake. Then we ran C4/Fish Mountain trail over to Oxbow Lake. It was pretty thin and bony past the cemetery and we had to navigate around some rocks. Quite honestly though, I was amazed the trail wasn’t completely brown.
Then we ripped across Oxbow Lake over to The Oxbow Inn for lunch. I chose the Philly Cheesesteak, which was good for the win! Crazy Cal had ordered it, so I just went with it. One less decision I had to make.
The way back
We returned to Indian Lake the way we came, figuring it was best to repeat our success – even though we didn’t loop via Carpenter Hill & Mud Lake Road. By mid afternoon, it was snowing pretty good as squalls rolled through. Perkins Clearing picked up an inch or two.
Trails around Indian Lake were still in decent shape when we got back into town before evening. After I parted ways with the gang, I banged out a victory lap and refueled for the next ride. Got back to the compound with 99 miles more than I would usually roll on a Sunday. On top of that, we shared snowmobiling stories that made me sore from laughing so hard. Great times!
It felt awesome to get in my first real ride of the season and shove that monkey off my back. Now, I can look forward to upcoming rides and squeeze out as much fun as I can.
If you’re curious, I’m absolutely loving the 900 ACE Turbo, Renegade X. It’s gonna be a mega-miler masher!
Bottom line & Midweek Outlook
In all honesty, we need another dump of snow to get this show to mid-winter par. But I gotta say it was a better ride than I would have expected for the weekend with these low-snow conditions. The groomers are out there trying to piece together acceptable snowmobile riding. Yes, you’ll clank carbide if you chose to ride here. BUT WE ARE RIDING!
Aside from some touch up snow Monday night into Tuesday morning, I don’t expect much action through mid-week. But it could get busy with snow by the weekend as the modelology is sniffing at a possible major nor’easter. Last night’s GEM run was looking particularly nice for Saturday. As always, the demons always lie in the small scale details. But it certainly has my attention!
One more thing
UpstateSnow’s Rich Lupia went against his better judgement and invited me back to his Trail Talk podcast to achieve repeat offender status! Click here to listen.
It’s always great to talk with Rich and I’m looking forward to having a snowmobile ride with him this winter. I’m sure that’ll end up being a good story to share on ilsnow.com
For the ilsnow nation,
Darrin
This report is brought to you by Steet Ponte Auto Group. Many of the vehicles here in Indian Lake are bought from the Steet Ponte. Co-owner Joe Steet is a huge fan and booster of ilsnow.com. If you’re looking for a new truck, give Steet Ponte a good look.
