Well day late and a dollar short but here's what we got. Monday night at 630 through Tuesday at 3pm, we sent our only groomer out for a solid 21hrs. Quinten was out for the first 10.5hrs doing ITS 87 in completion, the Jack Pine connector to Mahoney Hill and all the in town trails we groom with the Pisten Bully. When I hopped in the seat, I did ITS 84, Iron Gate Rd, Withee Pond trail back to Mahoney Hill and touched up Tower 1 lookout trail.
In town trails done with pipe drags have yet to be done but should be touched up before the weekend. Dr Dave did make it out in Moscow down to the Bingham General Store and all the way to Wyman Lake doing some touch up and clearing several downed trees from the high winds we received on Mon night in Tues. All of which are clear and in good shape.
Riders should still use caution as trees were being cleared on the first pass Tuesday, with still more to clean up on the return back to town. ITS 87 was clear as of Monday night into Tuesday morning, but there were reports we received of down trees Tuesday night that were cleaned up thanks to Drew Foran. We have not had eyeballs on it since further north of town, nor the Jack Pine connector but assume all is well based on yesterday's traffic, and not hearing from anyone on other potential issues.
The trails came out mint! There is still exvcellent coverage on the majority of our trail system and the cold temps locking up the trails allowed for an excellent consistency to cut as deep as possible and get the trails flat. The reason being riders were smart enough to stay out of the harsh conditions, or turned around quickly so we were able to groom through Tuesday and get them flat with plenty of set up time. That being said the trails are hard and fast with some scratched up duff on top to help with cooling, but ice scratchers are highly recommended through the weekend.
ITS 87 South - The railbed is still completely covered...yes really, with snow even and currently minimal to no ice! Flat and Fast.
ITS 87 North - The first 3 miles of trail leaving town are still in fair shape, and get much better once leaving the pole line hill behind the high school all the way to the Rt 16 crossing. From there to Dead Water/Austin Stream bridge is still in good shape with no bare spots yet peaking out, but also not quite enough to hide all the ledging, but none of it is exposed just not ideal. Once crossing the Austin Stream bridge, the trail is in excellent shape to the Forks turn around.
Jack Pine connector - This trail has plenty of coverage and is still in excellent shape!
ITS 84 East - Has really good coverage with the exception of the first 50' from Rt 201. The rest of it all the way to the powerline where we meet Athens is in excellenct shape.
Iron Gate Rd - This trail is an abosulte smoke show right now. Great coverage, flat, and extremely fast.
Withee Pond - This trail is great from Mahoney Hill 4 way to the end where it meets the Iron Gate and upper Windmill trail.
Windmill Trail - This is surprisingly still in great shape. What I mean by that is the normal problem areas, (the powerline stretches, the steep "bulldozer" hill off the Quarry Rd, and the lookout section at Tower 30 normally blown off) are still all completely covered up as is the back side with no view we are normally having to switch over to at this point in the season
Bare in mind that this weekend is most likely going to be extremely busy considering current conditions, the up coming weather, and the fact that it is Reciprocal Weekend. This will bring riders in from NH and VT for the last hoorah! That being said....PLEASE USE EXTREME CAUTION THIS WEEKEND AND STAY ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE TRAIL!!! Although the trails are going to be extremely fast, riders need to take in to account all of the factors to avoid accidents!
Our groomer will be touching up the southern portion of our system tonight so that we can attack ITS 87 Friday night before the weekend starts, and will most likely hit 87 and 84 Sat night but not the connectors. If the weather holds out and permits us to, we will do the northern half of the system Sunday night, and the southern half Monday night.
Enjoy our trails, ride safe, and hope we got another week or two left...but dont count on it.
-Scott N