sledshack.com

A big snow storm dumped up to a foot of snow across parts of Minnesota on Nov 19th. It was a fairly narrow band but for still being November, this is a great way to start out the season.
After riding along in a Polaris Demo Tour event last February, I got hooked on the ’12 Switchback Pro-R model. I sold the F8 and snow-checked a Switchback shortly after the demo ride…
I picked it up last Wednesday and spent Saturday morning getting everything ready and checked over.
Thanks to the early season snow in MN, a friend and I drove down from near Fargo to Sauk Centre, MN early Sunday morning and rode South of there in the Greenwald to Paynesville area in the ditches.
We both had new sleds and got the first 40 miles out of the way breaking in the belt and hi-fax.
The snow near Paynesville got pretty thin so we turned around and did more riding back North of Lake Henry and also stopped in there for lunch at the Sportsman’s Den.
There were areas with some good powder North of there.

Have a good season!
-=Chris=-

The Fargo/Moorhead area received anywhere from 8 to 12+ inches today in an unexpected snow storm in November! They are also saying another 6+ possible over Thanksgiving. This may end up providing a solid base for some good early season riding. It’d be nice to put a few miles on in December for once! Be careful on the ice around this area as it has not had a chance to freeze over solid yet.
Rob and I have received a few emails asking if / when we ever plan on opening the message forum again.
We came to the conclusion that this site will remain but the forum will not be reopened.
There are too many politics involved in running a message forum unfortunately and it takes all of the enjoyment out of running one.
Like many things in life… it only takes a few bad eggs to spoil everything and SledShack’s forum was no exception.
Unfortunately a few select people decided to use our forum to post slanderous and sometimes downright disgusting remarks about another group of snowmobilers and ultimately threatened legal action against SledShack (not that SledShack LLC has any money to begin with…) for cleaning up their posts and mess they created.
Anyways… that whole mess really soured our view on the vintage Internet forum community in general and we have no interest in being a part of it any longer.
This site will remain however to serve its original purpose of documenting Rob and myself’s sled trips throughout the winter and providing useful information to other people snowmobiling in the state of Minnesota.

-Chris & Rob -

Rob and I finally got out for a ride together this weekend. We started in Hawley and followed some freshly groomed trails about half-way to Cormorant and then the groomer went back towards Lake Park/Hiterdal at the intersection between the Lake Park, Hawley and Cormorant trails. The Cormorant trails were ungroomed almost all the way to the Cormorant Pub. After a quick bite we picked up the trail from Cormorant down to Pelican Rapids. This was all freshly groomed and in good shape. Snow conditions are excellent in this area… get out and enjoy it while you can!
Rob’s freshly rebuilt XLT engine got it’s first 100+ miles on it today and it ran flawless.

-Chris

Get out and enjoy the fresh snow!
I rode from Crookston, MN all the way down to Cormorant, MN today. The snow conditions are great! There were two groomers out and getting the trails in good shape for the weekend. Temperatures are looking good for the next 10 days so we should have some prime snowmobiling for the next couple of weeks.
-Chris

My group was up riding the NSST from Beaver Bay, MN this past Friday and Saturday. It rained most of Saturday while we were up there with the exception of last night when it was snowing hard in areas of the NSST.
It finally switched to snow in Beaver Bay this morning when we left… wet and heavy. Most of the weekend was very foggy as well.
Overall we put on about 240 miles or so.
The group stayed at Cove Point Lodge just to the South of Beaver Bay.
We rode down to Gooseberry Falls on Friday. The conditions were excellent until we got close to the lake and then things get icy and the snow gets thin (which seems to be the case anywhere you go up there right now). It’s amazing what difference a mile or so can make in the snow conditions. Away from the lake you will run into areas with 2 feet of snow but close to the lake you can run into areas with just a trace of snow.
On Saturday we rode up through Finland, MN on the Moose Walk trail (excellent snow and trail – nice scenic overlook). We ate at “Our Place” in Finland which had a very friendly staff and good/cheap food. We rode from there up the NSST to Schroeder and through Tofte (I don’t recommend going anywhere near these two towns right now if you can help it unless they get more snow out of this storm. We were riding on mud trails to get gas in Tofte last night). We went about half way to Lutsen from Tofte before going back and then eventually taking the NSST back to Beaver Bay.
Note – There is a spur trail near Gooseberry Falls that brings you to a restaurant near Castle Danger. It is about 5 miles from the Gooseberry Spur. They advertise along the trails that they have gas. They do NOT have a working gas pump as of last Friday. I would try to call the place before you drive all the way there for fuel – overall it’s about 10 miles from the NSST to the restaurant).
Another note… there will be a sled dog race up there this coming weekend according to signs I saw posted. They will be using parts of the NSST.

-Chris

What better present can you get for Christmas, if you are a snowmobiling fan, than a record breaking snow storm? Most of the state got hammered good over the Christmas holiday. Duluth and East Grand Forks both got about 2 feet of snow during the storm. Locally in the Hawley area we got somewhere around 14 inches.
I would imagine in the next week or two a lot of clubs will begin grooming trails around the state.
I haven’t seen groomers out this weekend yet in the Hawley or Grand Rapids areas.
-Chris

It’s been a slow start to the 2009-2010 snowmobiling season in Northern Minnesota. Stay tuned… when we get snow, we will let you know how the trails are looking!