It was warm (low 40s) and sunny yesterday but dropped to 14 last night. I headed out for a ride hitting some St. Germain, Eagle River and Sayner trails. None of the trails I rode were groomed. The Sayner and Eagle River ones haven’t been groomed since the snow Sunday night/Monday but the St. Germain ones have been. The trails that have been groomed were much better. They were smoother and overall in better condition. There was melting with the warm temps and then things froze up solid with the cold temps. Areas that were slush were ice. Most trails had a very hard/solid feel to them. I was glad to have ice scratchers as some areas had no loose snow. Without a grooming, some trails were getting more bumps. I saw from bad up to excellent. There are areas brown from snirt. There were some bare spots – mainly on the insides of some corners. The carbides did scrape in areas. Then there were good areas. I found some trails that are holding up fine with the warm temps. They were mostly white with good snow cover and sweet to ride.
Plowed road trails seem to be take the biggest hit from the warmth. Ones that were holding an ice base yesterday had some bare areas today. Others are showing a lot of pavement. However, there are still roads holding a base that are okay to ride.
It’s getting late in the season and temps are warming which is melting some areas. We’ve been getting fresh snow periodically which helps cover the melted areas. However, once an area has bare ground showing, any warm temps or sun will melt new snow quickly. There are still plenty of nice trails but getting to them will mean riding some bad stuff.
