Crazy Cal dropped a dime on “I’m not going to work” day for a Thursday ride. Since my snowmobile was already on the ilsnow wagon, it was easy to load his sled onto the trailer the night before.
Avoiding the bump-n-grind on C8 from Indian Lake to Cedar River Headquarters wouldn’t be a bad thing, eh?
After my morning snow removal was completed, I picked up Cal and headed to Brown’s Farm at 1517 Cedar River Road, Indian Lake, NY.
There were already several trucks-n-trailers in the lot with people heading out to ride.
If you haven’t ridden from Brown’s Farm lately, Town of Indian Lake is grooming one of the snowbanks as a snowmobile trail, from the parking lot to the trailhead. That will help tremendously when that road dries up.
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Heading out
As usual, S88 from end of Cedar River Road to Headquarters was a nice 4 mile start to the ride.
Moose River Plains, Indian Lake side was lumpy, but a half-foot of fresh snow cushioned the riding nicely.
Inlet side, Moose River Plains wasn’t as lumpy and we caught a fresh groom past Big-T intersection and had a white magic carpet ride to Inlet.
Inlet loop trails were great as always!
Got studder choppy from Gilbert Road into Inlet. Started encountering a lot of snowmobile traffic there.
Route 28 trail Inlet to Eagle Bay was a plush and snirty stripe. Trail 5 Eagle Bay to Rondaxe Road was pretty good riding, certainly by Trail 5 standards.
Trail 9 into Old Forge was newly groomed for the WIN!
Brantingham Run
Trail 1 north out of Old Forge was lumpy in places. Switched onto Trail 2 and had a pretty good ride to Big Moose.
Stillwater Road had good snow.
Quarter Mile from Hell on Brantingham bypass trail was an awful sea of washboard moguls. Worst of the worst riding.
C7E/Three Lakes Road was lumpy at first, then evolved into pretty good riding to HERK 40 intersection.
C7B/Ten Mile Crossing was lumpy in places, but bumps were tolerable. Final 2 miles to Partridgeville Road were thin and scratchy due to logging/plowing.
Partridgeville Road had great snow coverage, so we ran that into Brantingham and skipped C7B/Kovich trail.
Pine Tree Inn was very busy with dozens of snowmobiles in the lot. But the staff managed to get our food out in a timely enough manner accounting for the crowd. I had the black-n-bleu burger and sweet potato fries. VERY GOOD!
Going home
Decided to ride through C8A/Confusion Flats to complete the Brantingham loop. C8B/Van Arnam Road had enough snow to grease the skids to the good stuff on C8A!
C8A through Confusion Flats to Stoney Lake was some of the best riding of the day! Mount Tom section was bumpy in places and had a few water hazards to negotiate, but was passable.
C7B/Ten Mile Crossing was whooped up by late afternoon. C7E/Three Lakes Road held up better until we reached Brantingham bypass section – which was WHOOPED!
From Stillwater Road, Trail 2 was pretty good leaving Big Moose and lumpy entering Old Forge. Trail 1 was very lumpy. We made our sweet escape on Trail 9!
Trail 5 from Rondaxe to Eagle Bay was tattered and brown. But the roller-rama was actually kind of fun.
Eagle Bay was choppy. But Route 28 trail from Eagle Bay to Inlet was pretty good. After bumping and grinding from Gilbert Road to Ole Barn, we hit up the immaculate Inlet loop trails before heading back to the truck.
Moose River Plains by evening
Inlet side was a fun rip with powder flying everywhere! Just a few long wave rollers here and there.
Indian Lake side had lots of small bumps and some whoppers thrown in there. Thankfully, bumps were soft and forgiving enough to permit a good ole country hardball ride to Headquarters.
S88 to end of Cedar River Road was a good 4 miles to end the ride on a high note.
Got back to Brown’s Farm with 162 miles for the ride. And we didn’t have to mash through C8 back to Indian Lake. The comfortable truck ride home was just what the good doctor ordered after our brush with Weekend Lite.
Bottom line
If I knew snowmobiling traffic would be THAT heavy, I might have tried something else. Guess people wanted to get it before bitter cold sets for the weekend. Can’t blame them for doing that.
Crazy Cal got his maiden winter voyage and we got to laugh at some weekend-like idiocy. Wasn’t all bad!
For the ilsnow nation,
Darrin
