Oh, What a Night.... 170 miles of amazing!!!
Well Chenzo and I finally got out for our first true night run of the season. It was a fun but interesting night to say the least. We headed out around 7:15 from the PPSC clubhouse and headed East on E108 towards the Ganny. At the entrance to E108 I was amazed to see what must be 15 foot high banks curling over with the wind and blowing snow. We started cruising down E108 which was smooth but not yet groomed (It was later in the evening). Not 5 mins into my trip I start to see what appears to be 4 wheeler tracks, and not a min later I see tail lights in the distance ahead of me. Could it be that I'm finally at the right place at the right time and with my vest on.... Yuppers, two quads directly ahead of me cruising down the trail, Chenzo and I came to the stop sign and they had turned right, we quickly jumped ahead of them and blocked them into the snow bank.... Anyways, the rest is history!! We continued onto Noone's, most of the trails we 8/10 with the odd (very occasional) rock click. We fueled up and then headed into the ganny.. Everyone knows there is nothing like running the ganny at night. The trails int he ganny were about a 6.5/10, not bad but the rock clicks were a few more than they were earlier and the corners were pushed up a bit (not yet groomed that night). We stopped at the lookout and ran into a couple othere riders. From there we (I) decided that we would run to Rhino's (I didn't tell Vinny that). The trails were pretty good on the east side with several freshly groomed sections. This is where I had my first "encounter" of the night. I'm cruising along the roller section headed east, I take the right hand side going up a hill, and BOOM... I hit something huge (still don't know what it was), but it was hard enough to knock me completely sideways and off the other side of the trail almost 10 feet away. I saved it before hitting any trees, but was very worried that I may have A-arm damage. Stopped to check... nothing. After that our trip was farely uneventful over to Bewdly. On our way back through the ganny, on the north side, the trails were great (8/10).... This is were I had my second "encounter" of the evening, I rounded a corner on the west end of the ganny and there right infront of me... a deer, I wasn't going terribly fast and was able to slow without making contact, but the deer leaped the front of the sled about 4 times before it decided which direction it wanted to go. That was close. We made our way out of the ganny, and over to noones again for gas. On our way back, just before the Long Sault clubhouse, I got thinkin about the deer again, and I said to myself it would really suck for a deer to jump out right now, then I pictured the Mag -*test*-('") rider smoking that deer with the crossfire, and not 10 seconds later what jumps right infront of me....... Yup, a deer. This time I wasn't so fortunate, I was movign at about 50 mph, and was able to slow to about 40 mph.... then BANG, smoked the deer with the left front corner of the sled. I slowly came to a stop fearing the worst. I get off the sled, and guess what...... no damage, could I be this lucky. So I pulled the deer hair out of the hood screens and carried on. We got back to the clubhouse via Trail #4, and let me tell you, our groomer op's have done an amazing job with this trail. There was 2 foot ruts just last week and now it's smooth as silk. Minus the 4X4 ruts in the snow, from me chasing another ass hat off that trail... We got back to the clubhouse and went inside for a sec... It was at that time that Chenzo and I decided that we couldn't let this night goto waist, so we called the wives, told them to not wait up.... Then started the second half of our journey...... We had wanted to check out PPSC #3 to see what kind of shape it was in... So we headed for town via the land trail, which was surprisingly good. Once we got onto the lake we noticed that one of our groomer op's had been down to the causeway along the stake line so we knew we were in for a treat. Sure enough all the way until almost the ditch going to Espon was fresh perfect ribbon. We even ran into the groomer and stopped to chat for a sec. We made sure while traveling these fresh trail to be very light on the throttle as to not tear up the groom to much, so it could harden over night. We traveled the ditch over to lakeridge which hasn't been groomed as there isn't enough sonw to fill the ditch.... but this trail is very passable. Once we reached the rail line we couldn't help but notice the lack of grooming here.. until we reached Blackwater, then the trail had been groomed earlier in the evening. The fields coming back on E108 where a little bumpy due to the amounts of blowing snow. I forgot to meantion that it has been snowing pretty well the entire time since we left, and pretty hard in places. Once we reached the Nonquon, we noticed that the groomer has been through here too, and had headed south via the land trail. We were starting to get a little tired so we opted to leave that fresh grooming untouched and headed to port via the lake (I don't like running lakes at night, but I figured there was 2 of us, and with both our headlights together we could see lots). We took the canals back to the clubhouse, which also had just been freshly groomed. All and all, it was one amazing night of riding.... with the best conditions I have seen all year!! Minus the deer incidents..... OMG thats long.... sorry for making you read so much!!!! 8)
Well Chenzo and I finally got out for our first true night run of the season. It was a fun but interesting night to say the least. We headed out around 7:15 from the PPSC clubhouse and headed East on E108 towards the Ganny. At the entrance to E108 I was amazed to see what must be 15 foot high banks curling over with the wind and blowing snow. We started cruising down E108 which was smooth but not yet groomed (It was later in the evening). Not 5 mins into my trip I start to see what appears to be 4 wheeler tracks, and not a min later I see tail lights in the distance ahead of me. Could it be that I'm finally at the right place at the right time and with my vest on.... Yuppers, two quads directly ahead of me cruising down the trail, Chenzo and I came to the stop sign and they had turned right, we quickly jumped ahead of them and blocked them into the snow bank.... Anyways, the rest is history!! We continued onto Noone's, most of the trails we 8/10 with the odd (very occasional) rock click. We fueled up and then headed into the ganny.. Everyone knows there is nothing like running the ganny at night. The trails int he ganny were about a 6.5/10, not bad but the rock clicks were a few more than they were earlier and the corners were pushed up a bit (not yet groomed that night). We stopped at the lookout and ran into a couple othere riders. From there we (I) decided that we would run to Rhino's (I didn't tell Vinny that). The trails were pretty good on the east side with several freshly groomed sections. This is where I had my first "encounter" of the night. I'm cruising along the roller section headed east, I take the right hand side going up a hill, and BOOM... I hit something huge (still don't know what it was), but it was hard enough to knock me completely sideways and off the other side of the trail almost 10 feet away. I saved it before hitting any trees, but was very worried that I may have A-arm damage. Stopped to check... nothing. After that our trip was farely uneventful over to Bewdly. On our way back through the ganny, on the north side, the trails were great (8/10).... This is were I had my second "encounter" of the evening, I rounded a corner on the west end of the ganny and there right infront of me... a deer, I wasn't going terribly fast and was able to slow without making contact, but the deer leaped the front of the sled about 4 times before it decided which direction it wanted to go. That was close. We made our way out of the ganny, and over to noones again for gas. On our way back, just before the Long Sault clubhouse, I got thinkin about the deer again, and I said to myself it would really suck for a deer to jump out right now, then I pictured the Mag -*test*-('") rider smoking that deer with the crossfire, and not 10 seconds later what jumps right infront of me....... Yup, a deer. This time I wasn't so fortunate, I was movign at about 50 mph, and was able to slow to about 40 mph.... then BANG, smoked the deer with the left front corner of the sled. I slowly came to a stop fearing the worst. I get off the sled, and guess what...... no damage, could I be this lucky. So I pulled the deer hair out of the hood screens and carried on. We got back to the clubhouse via Trail #4, and let me tell you, our groomer op's have done an amazing job with this trail. There was 2 foot ruts just last week and now it's smooth as silk. Minus the 4X4 ruts in the snow, from me chasing another ass hat off that trail... We got back to the clubhouse and went inside for a sec... It was at that time that Chenzo and I decided that we couldn't let this night goto waist, so we called the wives, told them to not wait up.... Then started the second half of our journey...... We had wanted to check out PPSC #3 to see what kind of shape it was in... So we headed for town via the land trail, which was surprisingly good. Once we got onto the lake we noticed that one of our groomer op's had been down to the causeway along the stake line so we knew we were in for a treat. Sure enough all the way until almost the ditch going to Espon was fresh perfect ribbon. We even ran into the groomer and stopped to chat for a sec. We made sure while traveling these fresh trail to be very light on the throttle as to not tear up the groom to much, so it could harden over night. We traveled the ditch over to lakeridge which hasn't been groomed as there isn't enough sonw to fill the ditch.... but this trail is very passable. Once we reached the rail line we couldn't help but notice the lack of grooming here.. until we reached Blackwater, then the trail had been groomed earlier in the evening. The fields coming back on E108 where a little bumpy due to the amounts of blowing snow. I forgot to meantion that it has been snowing pretty well the entire time since we left, and pretty hard in places. Once we reached the Nonquon, we noticed that the groomer has been through here too, and had headed south via the land trail. We were starting to get a little tired so we opted to leave that fresh grooming untouched and headed to port via the lake (I don't like running lakes at night, but I figured there was 2 of us, and with both our headlights together we could see lots). We took the canals back to the clubhouse, which also had just been freshly groomed. All and all, it was one amazing night of riding.... with the best conditions I have seen all year!! Minus the deer incidents..... OMG thats long.... sorry for making you read so much!!!! 8)