The roads were pretty sketchy at points...glare ice from shoulder to shoulder, forcing you at times to ride the snowbank. The snowmobile trails made for much better riding. Pretty firm crust, but also icy at times. Icy enough where some studded tires would be perfect. The 2.4s on the Juice were almost overkill on this day, as no flotation was needed. I think the tyre PSI was at about 22 & 20, so they were pretty solid. On that note, I did have one good spill on some ice. I fell down fairly slow, but it still left me with a bloody knee and a sore hip. Meh.
On both days I was able to scout out a corridor trail (31) that I've been itchin' to ride for quite some time. There is one more section that runs north of Wagner road that I'd like to ride soon. I think/hope it connects to the Tuscobia Trail. If that's the case, I can essentially ride 3 blocks from my front door, and not ride another mile of pavement for as long as I can possibly endure.
What's also great about these trails is that they simply connect and cross all of the gravel roads that I became familiar with last year training for the Almanzo 100, so now there's all sorts of options for rides/routes. I'm getting pretty close to mapping out an epic gravel/dirt grinder that should compete with some of the best. Excellent training grounds out here!
Here's a rough sketch of the two rides this weekend...the trails are hard to track on gmaps' satellite so they might look a little odd.
Saturday - http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4311618
The creek crossing above is at about mile 7 on Saturday's ride. I didn't ride beyond this point as the trail got pretty soft, but this past fall I rode about a 1/2 mile beyond it, and it thins out to an ATV width trail. The Gazetteer shows another 4-6 miles of trail that could be explored beyond that...hmm maybe one of these days. Out!
