[Trail twister]

Last night I had a dream of much nicer days with out all this stinking heat and humidity.
Ten of us original members of the Michigan trail riders snomobile club formed in 1972 had trailred our sleds to St Igenes where we got rooms at the Bridge View Motel to start our 8 day ride. Since we had became friends with Tom the truck stop owner years ago it was easy to ask to leave the trucks and trailers there for the 8 days.
We woke to 17 inches of new snow clear skies and a nice 23F. The first leg of the trip would take us to Grand Maria to spend the night. We crossed the golf course west of the truck stop to where the power lines crossed US2. This power line a local non groomed trail would take us to Moran where we got on the trail to the Soo trail. We left the soo Trail well before we would ever get to the Soo as we wanted to get to Little Lake Brevort and catch the local trail there to Trout Lake and have lunch.
After lunch we took another local trail that skirted the Fox river for a ways till we came to hiway 28, riding the ditch to the Hulbert corners we came into the village did a left turn on the East West road for the ride to the back side of the Tqu. Falls. A few pictures then we took out for Paradise and our first fuel stop. Jim and Donnas 4stroke yammies were the fuel economy leaders so far, the worst was Ben and Linda’s old Polarises a 340 and a 440 the smallest engines but muscle to keep up with the 500’s My wife and I were riding. From Paradise to Pine stump Junction area was a quick trip and from Deer lodge to Grand Maria slower as we ran a few two track roads., All were tired and ready for the meal we got at the hotel.
Hope I dream of the rest of the trip tonight.

[Retroit]

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee .....................................


[sound of snowmobiles]

[Nephler]

That's one thing I'm really looking forward to... SNOW!
Yeah, that sounds strange from someone coming from Alaska, but in reality, most of AK doesn't get much snow. Only once, since I've been here, have we gotten more then just a couple inches in one snowfall.
Though it will be a bit of a shock coming into the heat, as I type this, it's 50° and calling for highs around 75° today.

[Trail twister]

Laid down to sleep last night. So hot and humid not much sleep to be had. Finally about 3:30 AM the crazy barking of two of my dogs said get up and see what is going on with them.
Got both back in their inside pens and shut the doors to the outside pen. A quick check with the flood lites all on and the Q Beam didn't turn up any thing to have them barking like that. Then my wife tells me she heard a bunch of coons out in that area just before she decided to try and get some sleep. Guess that is what it was causeing the ruccuss.

Back in the house I opened up all the windows so to at lease catch the breeze.
I let my thoughts wander to much better days.
Woke up to a nice 28F sunny morning for the run from Grand Maria to Christmas for a fuel fill up and a mid morning break.
Leaving Christmas we head south to Shingleton and lunch if the resturant is still in bussiness. If not we will ride to Germfask for lunch. Supper was planed for late in Escanaba.
We got to Shingleton and found the resturant open. After a hearty lunch and plenty of coffee we hit the trail. This trail is a old rail road bed so it is nice and wide freashly groomed the night before and since it was a Tuesday not much in the way of traffic. We kept a steady pace all the way down to where the trail makes the turn to Manistque where we plasned on fueling up before heading west to Escanaba. Shrotly after leaving Manistgue Marvin had a belt blow on his cat. What a mess that was and took over an hour to get all the threads unwound and out of the clutch. We made it to Escanaba in a reasonable hour so we had time to swim in the pool and use the sauna and hot tub.

By the way all the trails except the locals trails can be down loaded off the internet. We have been snowmobileing in the UPPER since 1972 so have met many locals over the years who were more than happy to show us around their area.
while Michigans snomobileing is some of the best in the country we really much rather do our sledding in Minnesota.
We are much older now than in the 70's we like the fact that Minnesota has trail speed limts and enforces them. They also have drinking and rideing laws which they also enforce. Have never had a close call in Minnesota even on a weekend because of that we believe. Best of all a Non resident trail permit for the winter was only $11.00. You can ride legley from just about the Capital steps all the way up to Ely there are so many trails.