Great skate skiing on the trails

The mild temperatures continue and the cross country skiing has been great.  With daytime high temperatures in the 0 celsius range the ski trails have been fast for the past several days.  I’ve been getting out on the trail before 10 am each morning when the temperatures have been in the -2c to -6c range.  Today I took my skate skis over to the Red Pine Trail system.  The trail was groomed yesterday and firm but not icy.  The downhill sections were fast and fun.  The uphill climbs were good and I can feel the improvement in fitness over the last few weeks.

We’ve got a good base of snow thanks to the frequent snowfalls in December.  I looked back at Environment Canada climate records as far back as the year 2000 and this has been the snowiest December with 159 cm of the white stuff.

Getting out on the trails 5-6 days a week will help build fitness for my spring bicycle tours.  I have to sit down with my maps one of these days and decide where I’ll be cycling and how long my tour will be.  I’ve decided that 2 weeks is too short for a bike tour and that 2 months is probably too long so it will be somewhere in between.  Being retired provides a fair bit of flexibility.