Hitting The Snow
Both days of our ride in Routt County included a mixture of some trail riding and a heavy dose of cross country riding through lots of drainages, across wide open parks (meadows) and through thick stands of forested hills and mountains. It was a perfect blend of all the kinds of boondocking we enjoy from the seat of a snowmobile.
Day one found us heading north to play at the base of Hahn's Peak in more than a foot of untracked powder, then on to Circle Bar Basin, Dead Mexican Park (a Mexican really is buried there with a marker at the spot), Little Red Park, Big Red Park, the Continental Divide (along the Wyoming Trail), hillclimbing near the Hare Trail, climbing to the top of Dome Peak (10,524 feet) and riding parts of the Farwell Mountain Trail. Just after we hit Dome Peak we encountered a heavy snowstorm that forced us back on the groomed trail for a while before letting up and allowing us to head cross country through the trees again before heading back to the truck, literally on fumes.
Not surprisingly, the powder was deepest and lightest at the higher elevations, although even down low (if you can call 8,000-9,000 feet down low) it was very good, just not as deep.
The parks we rode through, including Little and Big Red, were untracked and the snow was good but we still couldn't help imagining what it would have been like to play on them with another two or three feet of powder. However, a couple of small parks we rode through at higher elevations were true powder stashes where the snow was coming over the hood. The snow was particularly good up along the Continental Divide (9,000 feet plus), which marks the border with the Mount Zirkel Wilderness. There is a trail along the Divide, appropriately named the Continental Divide Trail or sometimes called the Wyoming Trail, portions of which are groomed. The part of the Continental Divide Trail we rode wasn't groomed though, so we blazed our own trail through 1-2 feet of untracked powder. Parts of the stretch of CD trail we rode were wide and fairly open while in other spots it was dense trees and single track riding. The variety was fun and amazing.
The views from certain parts of the CD trail-where trees didn't obscure your view-were splendid, including in the Wilderness where peaks punctuated the horizon.