I skied the Brown's Pond, Hills, and Prairie loops right after lunch. The trails have pretty good coverage, although there's more brown showing through than I saw on Monday. The wind was sharp (SSW at 14 knots) when the trail took me out of the woods, but having decent snow made up for it. I found reasonable glide on the flats and good downhill control, but very little to no glide on the climbs, probably due to a combination of my old legs, poor technique, and cold, squeaky snow (+9F). The grooming was good (nice corduroy on most segments, lightly skied), but I'd rate the trails as fair only because of the brown starting to show through. All in all, it was a nice ski this afternoon.

(David Sonnenberg)

The temperature is fine, but the wind is bitter. It looks like the wind over the last few days has added some debris to the trails. Would definitely recommend B skis. I believe the trails were groomed yesterday, but the wind has drifted in some of the open spaces, degrading some of the groomers hard work. The snow is definitely still slow.

Photos:

(Levi Johnson)

Cold and noisy snow today. Great coverage with only a little bit of avoidable debris. Absolutely gorgeous with the fresh snow.

Photos:

(Levi Johnson)

Ski trails were rolled today. No tracks set but the old tracks are still present. Staff plans to groom tomorrow and set new track. The multi-use trails were groomed as well.

(Carolyn Friedrich, Washington County Parks)

I skied the Hills, Prairie, Brown's Pond, and back on the Hills. I avoided Savanna because of the wind (NNW at 9 knots, wind chill -5 F). There is good coverage with a nice base, a little rutting with corduroy underlaying a little loose snow. The snow is a little slow (+10 F), but the climbs are skiable, and the downhills can be skied with control and without snowplowing. I used my B skis because I'm a little paranoid about the thin snow we've routinely had, but good skis would have been fine today. Once again, the groomers did a nice job with the little bit of snow we got over the weekend.

(David Sonnenberg)

The skate trail had been rolled but the classic tracks were not groomed except by users on the Brown's pond loop. Although this made the skiing slow it was still beautiful and sheltered from wind.

Photos:

(Ann Cohen)

What a difference a day makes! Skate skied around noon, looks like they made a pass and got the right half of the skate deck churned up from the ice that formed overnight. One big loop (the brown loop?) was churned up with good edge. Classic tracks seemed ok when I hopped in them to double pole and avoid the few inevitable icy spots on the slate deck. Hopefully they made it around to groom some of the other loops because where they groomed was really great considering the big warm weather to overnight cold weather pattern. Thanks groomers!

(Amy Fredregill)

East ski trails groomed for skate skiing. Current track not reset and in good condition. Trails fair to good. Savanna trail around campground in poor to fair condition due to exposed trail.

(Carolyn Friedrich, Washington County Parks)

The MLK holiday skiers took a toll on the trails. I skied Brown's Pond, Hills, and a couple loops on Prairie. Skate deck coverage was pretty good, but it's getting packed hard, scraped, and rutted. The flat sections generally provided enough snow on one side or the other for decent skating, the downhills were getting scraped down to hardpack, but manageable, and the climbs were getting pretty churned up, especially the south faces. There are several spots with grass and soil starting to come through, and today's warm temperatures won't help. Looking at the sections I skied, I'd classify them about 70% fair, 30% trending towrd poor. It doesn't appear as though there is enough base left to re-groom, but the groomers have surprised me with some great rehabilitations in the past.

(David Sonnenberg)

Lake Elmo East: Skied outer loop - brown, green and yellow. Conditions and classic tracks were far better than I expected. Very few bare spots and fewer yet that required stepping over. Good tracks 90-95% of the loop which I was happily surprised about. Photo is typical trail conditions.

Photos:

(Lincoln Fetcher)