1st would like to say I am sorry for not getting a trail condition report for the poker run up Friday night.

Now here is the story behind the topic title.

So there we were, Shell Lake Lodge halfway thru the run grins ear to ear from the 2 1/2 feet of fresh powder riding that we just plowed thru to get to the lodge. Had dinner and plotted out our next move to Tal View(15 miles). The story was trail was put in and marked. After some debate and reassurance from the locals we decided to take the direct route overland, instead of the back track to Skwentna and then up Skwentna River.

Was ~SORTA of~ glad to have the BloomT Monster Trencher along as he took over from me and broke 12 plus miles of trail. The big problem was staying on the original trail with snow over the lights, nighttime, snowing hard, with feets of no base. But 4 hours later we completed the 15 miles, drunk wth fatigue, drowning in sweat, but still laughing at how bad the ride over to Tal View had been and how many sorry SOB's were going to be stuck all weekend.

On our return trip we left one from our group 3 at Yetena Station when he collasped from fatigue, which actually turn into a blessing in disguise, as I broke a drive chain on my '03 Firecat less then a mile from Yetena Staton. So I jumped on the sled he was riding and finished the run. Got home at 4:30 am, got up early Sat. morning, did what I needed to get done, got parts and headed back out Sat. afternoon. Repaired the beast and made the return trip with the broken sled and broken man. Offically completing our trip at 11 pm Saturday night 38 hours after it had all began.

Our story, of the trail by Braille, the bottomless snow (~5 feet plus, BloomT had actually had trenched to that depth a few times) had spread fast because as of 9 pm Saturday no one had made the run from Shell to Tal View by the direct route over the Old Iditarod Trail.

So if you did make that run this weekend and ran the Tal to Shell trail and wonder which damn drunked sailors had put the trail thru it was BloomT, Ryan(broken man) and myself. Had a super time and look forward to doing it again.

yea, thanks the trail's kicked my ass. It was fun though. Boy do i love that 163". Some of the lakes/ swamps were 5ft deep of wet bottomless snow and my m7 held up well. Everyone was stuck but me. Had to break a few trails also. We hit the river at about 8am and got back around 10:30pm yesterday.

SirCATchALOT and SirTREnchALOT - sounds like you are the iron men out there in the sticks! We'd love to see some pix if you managed to take any. I'll bet picture taking was a low priority on the ride though. Thanks for the update... it reads kinda like a Patrick McManus story! Where was Rancid Crabtree and the Troll during all this! :laugh:

Things were to wet, to dark, snow was to deep, was to tired. Sorry this is one for the believe it or not files...This was a definate gut check trek. At the end we all found where we were lacking in conditioning and riding capabilities.

sircatchalot did you get a good hand? one of the guys i rode with was in second place as of about 9ish last night.

What was his hand??? I had 2 Jacks w/ an Ace, didn't even make the list. Danielle G. from Yetena was in 2nd (2 pair, Q and 9's) when we passed thru. I drew her cards. Adam G. was 4th.

Also looking for everyones hand for discount on a sled lift.

i believe it was 2 a's & 2 Queens, 10 high. 1st place person had same but with king high, i think.

The pot was looking good. It was at $800 for 1st. Last year there were 5 hands for the whole weekend and I had two and finished 4 & 5th

ha, yea the pot was looking kinda nice. They had quite a few people out. It was alot of fun.

well I had nothing, what was it john, 2 cards towards a possible straight? yeah the trail was a bit rough for taking pics, but what a ride!!! The summit only trenched a handful of times, I think we lost count on who, what got stuck the most!! That was a 180 mile Powder/ hill climb. Well I got the powder screen on ALL the vents, hopefully it holds up. If it does, my clutch slipping issues are over, and no more trenching!!!
SORTA glad!?!?! Well I'm SORTA glad I pulled your butts out AFTER I broke the trail for you guys!! Ok, I left a few deep holes(hehehe). Oh and won't mention the Chain issue!!!!
I have to admit to everyone, that john and his firecats can hang pretty well with the powder sleds in the deep stuff that is literally bottomless. Yeah we got to pull him out a little now and then, but once you get him going, hes pretty impressive.

After the roadhouse pretty much everyone was getting stuck. there wwas 1 spot that was either a lake or a swamp that was about 1/2 mile long that was a stuckfest. we Spent about an hour there helping people get unstuck. It was nice though cuz it was untouched and the 163" loved it. I got to carve it up a little bit, But all my playing burnt up some gas and that stuff was 30 bucks for 5 gallons at trivista, unbelievable.
As for poker i had nothing also. Almost had a straight but i needed a 5.

I am heading back out there tomorrow. With the warmer weather things should have settled some and give us some base.

One of the big things Friday was finding freight sleds left in the trail. Guys were just leaving them. The 2 plus feet of fresh snow in 24 hours made it incrediable. The ride out on the river was fast. The ride back was alot slower as more people turned some of the bumps into craters. You are right about the fuel consumption. Generally I top off at Yetena and have plenty, but had to fill at Shell Lake and then again at Yetena to get back.

Which Roadhouse??? Did you make the run from Shell to Tal View using the Old Iditarod Trail or go back to Skwetna then to Tal View?

skwenta roadhouse. then we went to tal view, then shell lake and took the hill trail back to the river. we only went to skwenta once. Just remember to watch out for the overflow. It was getting bad saturday night.

I didn’t get to go to Yentna last weekend, but we are going this coming weekend. I hope the snow is still good. We are also planning a run to a cabin on Donkey Creek Lake; that should be a lot of fun. Any one been back to Donkey Creek Lake? Its way up the Yentna past the Squentna, I guess you go through a slough that takes off north-east from the Yentna, its not far past the Yenlow hills.

Bring dry clothes.....a good shovel, a rope, and a few extra bodies. Should be pretty good this coming week. I will let you know how much it has setup in the last couple of days.

It's good to hear that someone else had made the run from Tal to Shell direct over the Iditarod trail. I thought our efforts may have been for nothing.