towing Posted January 17, 2010 Report Share Posted January 17, 2010 (edited) :sad: ............. this season is not an easy one.... The facts: No new snow and we get warm weather in the last days, especially friday and saturday with no freezing in the night. Very bad timing because even the groommers did their job, the trails melt somewhat and had no chance to harden before being hammered by the traffic of the week-end.... here the report from my ride... We started our ride from home in the south of Lanaudiere, cloudy with 2Celcius. My friend Snowcruiser was with me and we go to meet 2 other guys north to Mandeville. Target was to lunch in St-Alexis des Monts area. Trails in the fields were in great shape... We had a surprise in the middle of a field, around 2 miles from the road... Propably a kid that try to make fun because there was no way to think this trail was a road at the road crossing.... maybe it will be less fun when he receive the bill to get out of there.... We then entered in the woods trails, the sand had mix with the snow in many places ride well but not so good to look at. Because it was pretty dark, many of my pics taken while riding are fuzzy but it was looking like that.. They have strange animals here, horses with cow colors... I am also wonder how they can count on this little fence to keep them in ???? seems to work. The trails that were so good last weekend around St-Gabriel the Brandon have suffered from the last days, still enought snow to ride but alot of sand mix with snow in many places... really need new snow here. At St-Gabriel de Brandon, we took a shortcut trail to Mandeville on the Maskinonge Lake... The local snowmobile club here had to deal with the loosing few miles of trails at the village entrance few weeks ago. They succesfully made a ridable alternate trail to patch this broken link , good here... We had to do a little road side, being not the best it do the job. We than met our partners as preview on the #349 trail and continued in north direction in Pourvoirie du Lac Blanc direction. It's a narrow woods twisties trail. We see an other strange thing in an hard curve in the woods... I understand that you should not expected to be assist very fast if you get in trouble.... ;-) This is a trail in very uneven ground so the snow cover was limit and we hit the bottom few time but stilll ridable. We arrive At Pouvoirie du Lac Blanc... to be continued... Edited January 17, 2010 by towing Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
towing Posted January 17, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 17, 2010 It was very soon so we decided to continu north on the #349 trail. Conditions improved as we go north and we stoped at St-Alexis des Monts Village to fuel-up. We continue and stopped to lunch at the Auberge du lac a l'eau claire. We than continue on the #349 to get at the #318 trail. The lac a l'eau claire (clear water lake) was safe but somewhat scary... We took the #318 trail in St-Zenon direction. The conditions there were pretty good just very few brown spot . And we got at the Mastisgouche park entrance. From there conditions got near perfect, very good... very quickly, we were at the crossing to in #350 trail down Koubec, we decided in place to continue on the #318 to link on the #345 north to Cabanon. It was a great choice because as usual, this this had very low traffic and was beautiful... 10/10 on the whole lenght... In the last strech, we talked with guys in a group of 5 sleds that overestimate thier gaz range in these warn condition and got dry... they were around 15 miles from Cabanon and some left enought gaz to do the distance so we continu... We than took the #345 down the Cabanon. First part in park road have hold not too bad but the last part that tend to be sandy suffered from the traffic, some curves begin to washed out pretty bad. The snowmobile club stand in spite of the weather and we crossed not 1 but 2 groomers !!! They were both on this same trail link but one continued to groom the #345 and the other one switched on the #318 we came from... We continue and fuel up at Cabanon... To be continued... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
towing Posted January 17, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 17, 2010 (edited) We than took the #345 trail to get back in home direction. An other groomer had quit the cabanon in this direction not far ago. The trail was flat with decent snow, on the limit side but the sand had mix with the snow on many places, ride ok but not looks goods. We passed the groomer few miles farther... Infront the groomer, we saw that the trail had been hammered pretty hard. We are now at the freezing point and the snow is still very soft. We felt the ski runners scratch the bottom often. We left the two guys we met near Mandeville at the #350 crossing to Koubec and continued to take a lunch at Réal Massé. Below, the #345 was bumpy but decent until pourvoirie St-Damien very low snow contamination by the sand but lower the trail got more dirty. St-Gabriel de Brandon had started regrooming their south and we got flat sandy trails up to the fields trails more south that were still in great shape to make our last strech home. Total 204 miles. To conclude for the first time since the beginning of the season, trails conditions degraded from the previous weekend. No real snow drop since the first week of january forced the groomers to work with the same snow. It was still ok until the cold let place to warm and the trails got hammered at the same time, the dirt from the bottom mixed with snow in many spots and the groomers do what they can with that. What I have seen in St-Zenon area is that the few miles on each side of the Cabanon seems to be the more contaminated. It is worse in the south of lanaudiere, St-Gabriel have many strechs that are heavily contaminated. Mastigouche park itself was 10/10. From what i heard, I would expected the more north trails (north from the dam) to still have good conditions but the high traffic trails from St-Zenon/ St-Michel really need new snow to whiten and shape up for sure... Alain Edited January 17, 2010 by towing Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GT Rider Posted January 17, 2010 Report Share Posted January 17, 2010 Thanks for the excellent detailed report. Your report is most appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuzzy600ho Posted January 18, 2010 Report Share Posted January 18, 2010 Hey Alain,,, Your detailed reporting is "top shelf",,, thanks for your time and effort,,, fuzzy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brdgbldr85 Posted January 18, 2010 Report Share Posted January 18, 2010 (edited) Alain, Thanks for the top notch quality report!!!!!! Edited January 18, 2010 by Brdgbldr85 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
towing Posted January 19, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2010 Thank you guys :D I really hope for a good drop of snow to share with you better news... Alain Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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