Ox

Here is the North Warm-up Shack on the D trail from Searchmont to Wawa. This is the first year that this shack has even been known to sledders for 20 years now as the trail actually misses it by 100 meters these days. But all fixed up and .. must be a sign or sumpthing to say that it is there. Chum said GAS heater! This is on the hydro, just off the Cross-Over road, aboot 30 klicks ESE of the Anjigami sub-station.

Chum and his boy rode near Wawa this last weekend. Said that the off-trail wasn't as bad as expected. Anywhere from 18" to 4' he said. D trail south was smooth with very little traffic. .

Are the coaches allowed on trail? Seems too wide to be able to git over in many places?

$2.90/litre? I might haft'a start riding a 6 or 8 stroke sled before too long!

I understood that it was a play on werds, but .. that didn't seem to help...

Never heard the term .. well, other than this I guess:

We don't need to know the guys name, but we Shirley don't need to know his phone number!

OK, so the Paul Harvey edit: (long winded) Me and my main riding chum for the last 20 yrs are both self employed in manufacturing in small businesses, and so what jobs or volumes that we have required of us at any time in space has a reflection on our riding schedule. We normally shoot for the week of or after New Years as that is usually the most quiet week, but it is not abnormal for at least one of us to put off a few days, a week, a month, or even not able to make it this year sometimes. (too often) My chum thinks that we may have set a new record for "put-offs" this year as we prolly edited our departure date 2wice a week for a month. We have delayed much longer, but maybe not as many times... So, one of the delays was that he found a 4 place trailer in Michigan somewhere that he wanted to drag out to Colorado with us. He has a 2nd house going up near Walsenburg, and for whatever reason, it was much cheaper and quicker to buy some of the supplies back here in Indiana and take out, then it was to buy them from the same box store out there. So bought this trailer to haul this stuff out there, and leave at the job site. But then when done there, he intended to drag the trailer to the other location in Colorado where we sled, and use it as a storage facility there, as the shipping container that he has there doesn't fit much, and it doesn't breath, and thus getting snow from sleds to vent out is a lesson in futility. (when not there for weeks/months at a time) So, I needed to fix my trailer brakes if I was gunna drag a trailer out, so I ordered a new controller, hoping that I could throw money at the problem to fix and not need to throw time at it. Turns out that it needed the time, and not the controller. (curses - foiled again!) Then I went to hook onto his trailer to make sure all worked, and we decided that the brakes on the trailer left much to be desired, but at least I was gitt'n signal to it. But I realized that the trailer was heavier than I expected, and I had a hitch actually break off here at home after dragging a trailer home from Colorado - via Wyoming one year. The thing had rusted away right at the rear face of the receiver, and while my current hitch wasn't all that old, I decided that I wanted to doo better, and besides, my ball was rated for 6K, and I guess that trailer to be all of that empty, so I bought a new solid hitch and 1.25" shank 2-5/16" ball, and now I have all the rating a fella could ever hope for! But wait! New development! Our riding chum out there is in the market for a good used sled, but all he can find out there is around $12K used! So my chum here is always scouring for deals, and so he said that he would look around for him. Turns out that he found a sled halfway between us (15 mile from each) for $8700. So we picked that up as well. Fortunately I had an open space on the deck of the truck yet, so that all worked out too. So we finally pulled out with newsed sled, heavily loaded rust bucket trailer with piss poor brakes, on Jan 31st I think, for our New Years trip. The very first corner that we came to after leaving his place - the trailer made awfull noises! We got out and gave it the once over, and couldn't find anything obvious, so I set my brake controller to zero and off we went, with full intentions to take the 4 lane most all the way so that the brakes weren't a big deal, but really, my truck didn't mind it back there at all, so ... 5 hours later, just after dark, we are in southern Illinois, and after hitting just one more bump, thing seemed to get bad somehow. Looking in the mirror I asked if that was (salt) dust or if that was smoke following us? It was decided that it appeared to be smoke, so we pulled off. No pics, but when I walked back there, the third axle was adjacent to the front two axles. Both tires were blown, and I was currently engaged in burning flat spots on the carcasses. "Well aint this just special!" Personally, I was ready to unhook, run home and unload my gooseneck and race back and winch it up on, and head back home aggin. My chum says "no", we're still heading west." So we took the tires off of the 3rd axle, and we hooked two ratchet straps onto the loose side of the axle and we worked it back and forth about 90* untill we finally fatigued the sub-frame on the other side, and tossed the axle in the ditch. The sub-frame on the passenger side had collapsed completely and the tops of the tires were wearing on the floor of the trailer, so we jacked it up as best we could, and slipped those blown tires/rims up between the axles and the floor joists. The tires still rubbed, but not as bad.... GPS says 6 miles to next exit. So off he started at 4mph, hoping not to get the tires too hot from rubbing. We made it 3 miles on our first go! Not too shabby! We had plenty of spares (and only 2 axles) so we were in high cotton! Changed out the tire and started off aggin, but this time only aboot 2 mph. Tire was still up when we got off the exit, but it was still 2 miles of country road to "somewhere". We had winders down so that we could hear what was going on back there, but when we got to the "somewhere" we found that the one tire had gone flat, and that we were running on ONE tire on that side. and it was WAY overloaded and also rubbing a bit. We backed it into a line=up of equipment at a fertilizer company, expecting that they wouldn't be needing that spot for a cpl months yet, left a note, and off we went, leaving a trailer with $40K in building supplies in someone else's lot.... This whole episode cost us 5 hours... Then there is the pics above of our time riding. Then we stopped by the fertilizer plant during working hours on our way home. So then last week my chum and another fella headed back out, planning on winching this 29' trailer up on his new 24' trailer, and continuing on out to the build site. He said that they did need to pull it forward a bit more yet for tongue weight, but they did make it the other 15 hours to their destination. I really like having my flat bed truck and not having to deal with trailers - normally... Word to the wise - don't buy 25 yr old skidoo trailers in Michigan and think that it is use-able....

OK, so - maybe I missed something somewhere, some time, but what is the Who Cheese story? .

LNG, Hydrogen, EV, or old skewl Detroit Diesel bus?

Boy, I'd'a thunk y'all'd'a got a lot more than that. We got 3.5-4" of freezing rain here. If that was snow?

Well I have to say that I feel like my 850 is awfully quiet, and I like that as well. Maybe it's not just the exhaust note, but the whole motor just seems so much more "tight" or "solid" I guess...

I doubt that it is all that much quieter at speed as the track sound starts to take over... .

Yep, freezing rain on this side of the lake this morning.

All that for 15hp?

So that the masses can see how bad they are now, before they go any further..... Edit - actually what that is - is so that they can be running Doo's in Yellowstone. The first with electric wins. They have had the "Best Technology" requirement for many years now.

Doo you s'pose there is any other group (maybe skiers I s'pose?) that search a dozen weather sites for the one with the most favorable predictions, and then going with that one?

Is that the place that is right by the R/R tracks?

I wouldn't expect the road to be ride-able at this point. I would Shirley expect it to be all mud. Normally - I would expect it to be OK, but it goes to dirt REAL quick when the sun comes out! For a road that the atlas says "Closed in Winter", that road gits quite a bit of traffic! Are you coming from F/106 I take it?

I think that I followed 1/2 of that?

Well "warm" alone is one thing, but toss in the big winds that we have here today, and it will REALLY speed up melting/drying, and the winds are headed your way! (WSW)

Could use a tad more snow to hold that sidehill... At least it`s on the RH side. (Downhill)

Had to check this thread out as I read "Red Stone" and "staked".... But it is Red Rock that I was thinking of. They run from Rossport to Red Rock over the ice, but I doubt anyone is ever staking that. That is prolly at least 25 klicks and very little traffic. (South of Nipigon)

Well, my '96/97 map showed the D trail from Searchmont to Wawa as 150 "miles" long. We were planning on gassing up in one of the stashes in the bush,. and I had a 6'er on board as well, but we were pushing 18" of fresh. Ass_u_ming that the gas was somewhere near the 75/100 mile mark - we were confident in our ability to navigate. When my 6'er was gone at 120 miles, and we still hadn't found the petro, crossed a rail line, or whatever else that the map showed, we realized that the trail was NOT 150 miles long.

89/90 trumps anything that I got!