We didn’t get much snow overnight but it’s snowing pretty hard now. This snowstorm is coming from the south, which is pretty typical for this time of year. Those storms often wane before they get all the way to NE Minnesota, but it looks like we’ll get a few inches out of this one, at least.
We’re getting a call almost every hour asking about the ski conditions. Snow melted throughout the state and we’re hearing that high school ski camps everywhere have been cancelled. Lots of people are looking for somewhere else to take their team skiers. We drove up from the Twin Cities two days ago and there’s no doubt about it–the Gunflint Trail has the only measurable snow left between Minneapolis and Bearskin. It looks like we still have pretty good snow, at least when compared to everywhere else. Unfortunately, it’s not quite enough anymore for the ski trails.
The ski season got off to a great start, but now after our most recent warm-up we have a thin icy base. We wouldn’t recommend going out there to ski at this point. The last guest to head out skiing on the trails said conditions were hard on his rock skis. So we need more snow. There’s snow in the forecast for the next few days. We just need a few more inches of snow over this base in order to have enough snow to groom the trails again.
Meanwhile, the ice is finally freezing firmly. Erik, our musher, went out on the ice yesterday to sink in the poles he uses to tie up his dogsled team. And it is snowing now in a way that looks just like being on the inside of a snow globe , with glittery flakes swirling in many directions. We’re making progress towards real winter.
The Gunflint Trail Volunteer Fire Department, the group of well-trained area volunteers who would rescue you if you were ever lost or injured up here, conducted a training session on our trails last night. The good news is that they “found” Jen, so she didn’t have to sit endlessly by the lake in campsite 5, pretending to be lost. The bad news is that all the trails will need to be regroomed after all the “searching.” Current conditions give new meaning to the trails being “tracked.” We suggest that you don’t come skiing this morning, so you don’t have to ski through the footprints of a dozen searchers. Trails should be good again later this afternoon.
In general, skiers have been quite happy with the trails over the past few days. “Surprisingly good” is what we’ve heard repeatedly. We will still need more snow to open most of the trails, but Summer Home, Campground and even the Lit Loop all offer a good “first ski of the year” experience.
As soon as it snowed, skiers were out on te trails. This is after Campground was rolled but before it was groomed.
Winter arrived on Thanksgiving night. A light rain gradually turned to steady snow in the late afternoon. We expected a couple of inches, so we were surprised to find 8 – 10 inches or more on the ground by morning. This is a great start to the ski season.
Friday was spent plowing, shoveling, and generally digging out. The first snowfall of every season is always a challenge. The ground is not especially frozen underneath this snow, which makes plowing and shoveling much tougher.
If all goes well, Bob may go out on Saturday and try to roll the Summer Home Road Campground Loop Trail. Meanwhile, it is back-country skiing at this point. We had guests who skied out there today and reported having “first snow of the year” fun on the trails — not fast, not groomed, just fun to be out in the fresh powder.
Season passes as well as daily ski tickets for the 2012-2013 ski season are available at both Bearskin Lodge and Golden Eagle Lodge. We share the proceeds equally between both lodges, so it doesn’t matter where you purchase your pass. The funds from your ski pass go to pay a portion of the maintenance and grooming on the ski trails; passes don’t cover all of our costs, but they make it possible. The US Forest Service/Superior National Forest takes a fee , as does the Minnesota DNR for the small portion of the trail on state land. You are supporting excellent skiing on the Central Gunflint Trail System when you buy your pass.
Waiting.
At this point in the season we watch and wait and wonder when the snow will fall. We have perhaps an inch of snow cover at the moment, but that could last for the rest of the winter, or be gone tomorrow. It’s an unpredictable time of year.
We had a great turn-out for trail trimming weekend on November 2nd & 3rd. We’ve learned the hard way that small trees and branches which appear to be well off the ski trail often turn into trail nuisances after a heavy coating of ice or snow bends them over the trail. The trail trimming crew did a great job of trying to spot those potential problem branches and trees beforehand, then cutting them off.
Because our trails go through the rocky, hilly woods instead of over mowed grass paths, we need more snow than some other ski resorts do in order to make a nice base. We’re fortunate to be in a “sweet spot” that almost always gets snow even when the rest of the North Shore area ends up with rain or sleet, but it’s still difficult to predict when we’ll have enough snow for a base. We are lucky to have the G2 snowmobile groomer in addition to our pisten bully groomer, so we can get out on some of our trails with fairly minimal snow.
Last year skiing was good at Bearskin beginning in late December, and it stayed fairly decent even when the Twin Cities news channels were claiming there was no skiable snow in all of Minnesota. No, we did not have as much snow as we normally do, but in many years the amount of snow we get is far in excess of what we need to provide awesome skiing. The Central Gunflint Trail had decent snow until the big melt in March. By our standards, that was short ski season–many years some of the best skiing occurs in the month of March. But we were happy to be able to provide good skiing for that long in 2012 and because there was almost no snow again on the North Shore, many new skiers were introduced to our great trail system.
We’ll keep you posted on this site as the snow begins to accumulate. For more frequent updates, you can also check out our Facebook page for info; updates to that page are also sent to @BearskinLodge on Twitter, if Tweets are your thing. Those updates involve almost no time commitment for us, so they happen more frequently than the blog updates do. As always, if you are wondering about snow conditions, just call us directly at 800.338.4170 during business hours.
The 2012 Trail Crew at dinner, after a good day of trimming the ski trails.
You can tell snow season must be right around the corner because the first surefire sign of winter is occurring everyday now: Bearskin and Golden Eagle are trimming the trails.
Most skiers don’t realize how much work goes into maintaining our 70+ K of trails in the fall. Early in the fall we drive on all the trails, looking for fallen tress and giant limbs blocking the paths. It is not unusual for us to clear extremely large fallen pines and birch from the trails after a long windy summer. It would be nice if one pass would be enough, but our autumns are often very windy. Since the first time Bob and Quinn cleared all the fallen trees from the trail in early September, many more have gone down. It’s a constant battle.
Next, the long grass and little bushes that have grown up all summer within the trail need to be mowed down. In one summer a bushy little tree in the midst of the trail can grow 3 feet or more. Bearskin and Golden Eagle share a large “Tiger Mower,” similar to the type you might see mowing the roadsides along a highway. Running the mower always takes a great deal of concentration. The trail is studded with big rocks and fallen limbs — mowing here is very different from the type of trail mowing done at many cross-country ski areas where the trails are actually through grassy fields.
Mowing is too difficult on many areas of the trails, so for much of September and October we regularly send staff members out on the trails to trim by hand with a weed whip. Whoever does this job usually ends up with a few good “too close to a moose/bear/mystery wild animal” stories by the time the trimming is complete.
Boughs, branches and limbs from trees along the trails are constantly growing over and into the trail space. An overhanging branch that appears to be well out-of-the-way becomes an impediment when it’s loaded with snow or ice. It’s difficult to keep our trails from getting narrower over time. Our trail clearing crew for “Work Weekend” will walk the trails with nippers and saws, cutting back encroaching branches.
Everyone gets excited when the snow finally comes and the big grooming machines make the first runs on the ski trails. But by that time, Bearskin and Golden Eagle have been preparing the trails for many months.
We made our last attempt at grooming some trails on Wednesday. Grooming was semi-successful but the snow has continued to rapidly melt. Now we have a significant number of bare sections on many trails. It’s time to declare this winter ski season on the Central Gunflint Trail System officially over.
Realistic assessment of snow conditions: our trails held up OK during the warm, sunny days, but yesterday’s rain and strong winds were very hard on the snow.
We’re opening a few of the trails on this side of the system for snowshoeing. You’ll still need a trail pass. Bear Cub, Poplar Creek, and Oxcart can be experienced right now on snow shoes, a fun and different way to get back into a Superior National Forest area that you can normally only traverse on skis in the winter.
This is the Gunflint Trail in far northern Minnesota, so we’ll be fairly surprised if we don’t get another big dump of fresh snow to groom. We’ll turn these trails back into great ski trails again if we get the snow. But the current forecast looks like several more days of discouraging melting.
Very, very strange weather. We’re lucky–when the rest of MN has been dealing with erratic weather this winter, we’ve consistently had nice snow on the Gunflint. We’re in the sweet spot for snow. Figuring out what to do in these conditions is not fun, so we’re grateful that we didn’t have an entire winter of solving a snow problem.
Total snowfall since November 1: 64.20 inches
Spring skiing is here with solid trails in the morning and softening during the day. For the most current conditions, call us.
The temps are great, but the conditions vary by the hour. The ski trails firm up overnight with below freezing temperatures, and then get soft in during the day. Here are some tips:
Classic: Best skiing is in the morning while the tracks are still firm from setting up over night. The tracks may have a glaze of ice if the temperature is still below freezing, but that will go away soon when the snow warms up. At some point the firmness and structure go out of the snow and the tracks get soft. The best wax for these conditions is: waxless skis. Conditions change so fast
Freestyle: Ought to be really good early. Use a soft glide wax and get out there while the skate deck is still frozen and firm. At some magical moment the whole thing will collapse and you’ll have to slog back to the lodge.
Snowshoeing: Still great!
We’re hoping these unusually warm temps don’t last. We expect to get more snow. It’s not uncommon for us to still have snow in early May. This weather is probably just a teaser.
Bearskin Lodge Ski Trail Reports 