Greetings and welcome!
I said that I would return with some pictures, and here we are. Here are a few of the groups that came to the Rapids last weekend, and Dan Guendert, Secretary & Membership Director from Chute Pond Snowmobile Club sent trail pictures in the e-mail..
I’ve attached a few photos of our riding this weekend. Trails around Suring are thin to bare- we need more snow down there. Trails from Chute Pond and north are in good to very good condition. We rode up the RR grade north of Mountain (pics 281, 283, 284), out to Boulder Lake (pic 285), up to 9 Mile Resort (pic 017), over to Townsend, down to Lakewood, then east from there (pics 286, 288), and all trails in those areas are in very good shape.
Read on for the earlier posting..
1pm Update
That was a pretty fun week and weekend. For a change we had trails between Christmas and New Years, and a lot of people took advantage of it.
As expected the trails saw a lot of action and the conditions varied based on how much traffic was seen before the groomers came through. Based on the rain snow lines conditions also varied from area to area. Reports said that it was possible to ride out of the snow zone if you went far enough to the south, north or west.
I did get to see a lot of old friends over the weekend and it was pretty fun. I will have some pictures later as soon as I track down the camera.
I made a big deal out of the full moon on New Years, but missed that it was a blue moon as well. A blue moon is the second full moon of the month, and our next one will be in August 2012. Our next blue moon on New Years will be in 2028. It was also a partial solar eclipse for some parts of the world.
A lot of people asked about future storms. There isn’t much to get excited about at the moment. The GFS has high pressure camped over us for the next few weeks.
There will be a few small disturbances that will pass occasionally with the minor variability of the weather. Those could bring occasional light snow to freshen things up. There will also be a prevailing north wind, and lake effect snow will be common up in the UP. Every so often, like in the forecast today, some might actually blow this far south and give us some flurries or light snow.
There is also a warm day or two showing up about 1/15, where we might briefly hit 32+. There are no big storms, but there are no big brutal cold waves either. There is a chance of light snow again Thursday/Thursday night.
What I am interested in is the other side of the high pressure area. As this drifts east we could start seeing some bigger storms. That isn’t on the GFS, yet. By my theory as the big low drifts east it will act as a guiding force to push a storm or storms our way. As the storms move west to east, they hit this giant brick wall of high pressure and get squeezed north.
That is pure speculation, but a plausible scenario. For now it is something to watch for as we ride what we have in pretty seasonal or slightly below normal temps.
I will also submit that it is a possibility that the forecast might actually change over the next few weeks. We had a similar outlook before Christmas, and that ended up working out very differently.
I am going to keep moving and dive into what is shaping up to be an intense day for work. I will be back a little later with some pictures.
Have a good Monday and thank you for visiting!
RJB