ALTURAS SINGS UNDER AFTERNOON SUN

On Thursday, December 14th, international monkey day, the ski trail to Alturas Lake was groomed on through the last jumble of trees and to the lakeshore where a million bouquets of feathery ice crystals festooned the frozen surface. Sun and ice joined in an otherworldly song that filled the air with a zinging pinging swooshing tune. The packed trail to the lake was graded flat and wide on Friday and should be great for skating and flat trackers. Wapiti still has grassy areas and some boulders on the front half – not recommended, back half ok, North Cabin is graded but sort of rough and bumpy in spots, Sheep Thrills – graded but rough, and the first stretch of trail from Highway 75 to the trees – ridiculously bare! Don’t let the sagebrush scare you away. At Park Creek, all trails except for Sego were groomed and work to remove the downed trees on Sego made some progress on Friday. Since there are still so many trees across the trail there we are thrilled to have scheduled Rob Beck’s tree service to start clearing there on Monday.