Greetings and welcome!
It was a very windy day Thursday and the sun stayed hidden behind the clouds. After sunset we had a few snow showers that didn’t add up to anything here, but was enough to get the road white up by Carter. The wind was whipping the new snow into snow clouds and mini snow tornadoes.
After work tonight I made my Lakewood/Townsend/Carter Hwy 32 run for gas and supplies. It was hard to see the railroad grade in the darkness, but the crossings that I did see looked good with full coverage. There was noticeably more snow north of Townsend and about the Valley Inn.
On the way home I took the forest roads between Lakewood and Silver Cliff.. Smyth Rd to Holt’s Ranch to Buck’s Ranch to Landing 11 Rd to C.
Smyth Rd was pretty bare where the town had plowed and treated it. The ice base started after the treatment stopped east of the houses. It was a good sturdy ice base with good coverage even in sunny areas. The trail crossings on Smyth Rd and at the pipeline & Buck’s Ranch Rd were freshly groomed and looked nice.
Where buck’s Ranch Rd turned into Caldron Falls Rd the paved areas were pretty bare except in shady spots. Once Landing 11 turned back into gravel the nice ice base returned.
Once I got to Silver Cliff on Landing 11 the paved road got spotty for ice coverage.
I can only judge what I see out of the car window and shining a flashlight down the trail at road crossings. The trails looked good from that view. They might be thin or rough or perfect 200 yards down the trail, I couldn’t say.
The 2-3″ or so from Friday night’s clipper will go a long way on the forest roads with a big ice base as well as on bare spots on paved roads. Hopefully it will bring the first ride of the season.
A travel warning.. The big ice base thing wasn’t lost on the roads. Watch out for the corners on Hwy C in Silver Cliff. They have a lot of bumpy ice, especially by Fox Lake Rd, the first corner after the long stretch heading west from Athelstane. It is bad in the corners all of the way to the county line by McCaslin Mountain. It won’t be obvious under the snow.
Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!
RJB