Conditions for Sweetwater Challenge #2

Photos to follow (I forgot the cord to my camera, on my way to work at noon.)

We had 9 teams on the trails last weekend for our winter campout. We had a hard, fast base then got 6 inches of snow Sunday/Monday. Trail conditions are good. We have groomed the trail twice this week so far. There's a little snow in the forecast for this weekend.

Our mile-long driveway is in good condition - some areas down to dirt as we have been scraping it down to dirt when ever we can.

There are a couple of patches of ice in the open area between the lodge and camping area - the icy spots are covered with snow so are deceptive for foot traffic - this is not an area where the dogs will be running. Never hurts to pack your YakTrax or other ice-walking human foot gear.

We always recommend that you have a good drag mat on your sled for running our trails - we do have several hills on the course and it's safer for the dogs if you can slow them on the downhills or if the trail is hard-packed. The more dogs you run, the beefier of a dragmat you need.

Drag mat with snomo studs photos

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Sideview

Friday, 10 a.m.

The trails have held up through the thaw and rain...it got down in the 30s overnight and it's supposed to get cooler as the day goes on getting into the teens tonight. 6 inches of pack left where we've been packing trail all winter - I've been measuring where Rick plowed once - a nice mistake to find out about this a.m.

We will try to find time to shovel some snow on the driveway where the trail crosses the drive. 32nd St. is in good shape. Our driveway is mostly bare with a few icy patches.

Looking forward to running dogs this weekend!

Thursday photos

Photos from noon today, 02-16-11

Here's Sting on the trail next to the driveway.

Here's a shot of the metal ruler, tapped into the snow pack - shows 6.5 inches of snow pack left on the trail.

A kennel shot to compare to the one on Saturday.

A look at the Coyote Pass trail where it crosses the driveway. The leaves are on top of the packed trail, not showing through the snow to the ground.

A view of the kennel from Saturday, the 12th

Like I said, we have LOTS of snow...we got a little sleet overnight, now the sun is out. We'll see how much rain we get tomorrow night....

Waiting out the melt....

Been reading about folks north of us getting rain overnight, last night...not here thankfully, we got about a 1/2 inch of snow. In the 30's today with lots of sunshine. We do have a LOT of snow pack on the trails...waiting to see how things hold out for the weekend. We have a really nice location for our impromptu campout. If I can figure out the new camera, I will post a photo from Saturday, the 12th showing all the snow in the kennel.