It is official, the first two loops up at Birkie Trail Head will open Thanksgiving. Together the loops are approx. 1.3km. Birkie "All Access" ski pass required. Reminder: Fri-Sun is Turkey Birkie Skiing (details on website). Next week as it cools down we will again resume making snow, going much quicker now that the big areas a complete. Happy Thanksgiving from the Birkie Trail crew!

Photos:

(Kurt Proctor, American Birkebeiner)

We skied south of Boedeker on both the Skate trail and the Classic trail. Skied all the way to Double OO. 4" of snow and we never hit any rocks. It was 11 degrees when we started and that felt a little chilly. Norwegian grooming (made our own tracks). Big change is there has been logging near kilometer 31 on the Classic trail. About a kilometer of trail has had the east side logged off of it. There was also a small section of the skate trail near where the snowmobile trial crosses near km 31 that has also had some logging - I'd say about 100 meters or so.

Photos:

(Dan Murphy)

Enjoyed some nice skier-made classic tracks this morning. About 4" of loose snow with no base underneath. Many sticks and occasional rock so glad I left my good skis at home. I hope the snow survives the warmup.

Photos:

(Tom Wilton)

Started from Birkie trailhead and skied on the powerline section for a while. The trail is just barely covered with snow and the skiing is pretty slow - definitely something that only the fanatics will enjoy. Regardless, I got a few k's in and enjoyed my time! I would recommend classic skiing instead of skate as there's not much of a snow base to push off from. Also, use kickwax that is on the colder side. I used warm stuff and was icing up really bad. They had the snow guns going when I was there, so it looks like they'll have the loop groomed sometime soon!

(Andrew Einspanier)

About 2-3 inches of fresh snow on top of an ice layer provided a fun morning ski. I skied about 10km out and back on the trail south of OO. I hit one rock that caused me to fall hard. But that was the only rock I hit. I used old fish scale skis and they worked well unless I skied over a puddle and then the would ice up.

(David Nelson, Skinnyski.com Race Team)

Let ski season 2020-2021 start - Snow guns running in Hayward at Birkie Trail Head, No trails open yet but this should freeze up the ground in start area.

Photos:

(George Larson)