Credit Pixabay.com
Snowmobile routes and ATV/UTV routes sometimes use the same trail segments on the Vilas County Forest, but often maintenance issues develop between the two groups.
Last week the Sno-Eagles Snowmobile Club of Eagle River requested to be given upkeep responsibility of the current ATV/UTV trails south of Bauer’s Dam.
But the Landover ATV/UTV Club of Conover is opposed to that action.
Sno-Eagles representative Howard Wolf indicated their membership voted to become a duel sports club and currently maintain 90 miles of snowmobile trails.
“If we are awarded the ATV/UTV miles discussed, our club will ensure they are always safe, sign compliant, and well-groomed for our guests to the Eagle River area,” Wolf said.
1:17
“We are now operating,” said Mark Stuber, the chalet coordinator at Minocqua Winter Park. “We have been biting our nails waiting for enough snow and we finally got it.”
After a late start to the ski season, Stuber said their core trails are groomed and ready for classic skiing.
Cross-country ski trails in Rhinelander, WI are also open to skiers.
The Rhinelander Area Silent Trails Association finished grooming trails in the area.
Dennis Zielinski, the association’s grooming foreman, said the trails have been compacted, but not tracked.
“Ski it, but don’t have too high of expectations because we just don’t have that much snow,” he said.
Katie Thoresen/WXPR
In the Rhinelander area, snow is starting to pile up on the sides of roads where it’s been plowed, but in the woods with more tree cover, tall, dry grass and brush still pops up through the thin layer of snow.
To the north, Iron and Gogebic Counties have upwards of four inches, even a foot in some places. Those counties has snowmobilers hitting the trails over the weekend.
But places Vilas County and to the south barely have two inches of snowpack on the ground.