Tim Kelley Alaska Winter Trail and Spring Skiing Photos

Winter Trail and Spring Skiing Pictures - 2006 by Tim Kelley and Friends


Paradise Island Skiing in the Sound: Early June skiing on the spine of Culross Island. The snow was quasi-crust, consolidated summer snow which made for good skiing up to the 2500' highpoint of the island. And it was good snow for cutting turns coming back down.
	Skiing Circles Around a Poet: The distinctive peak at the east end of Portage Lake is Bard Peak This was a spring ski across Portage Lake, up the Burns Glacier, across the Whittier Glacier, down to Whittier, up over Portage Pass and then back across the lake ... the Bard Peak Circle.
	Homer's Home Run Crust: There is not much debate on this fact - Homer, and neighboring areas, have the best crust skiing in South Central Alaska. The snow has a higher moisture content to set up hard and fast. The rolling ridges behind town with a great mix of forest and open areas are perfect for crust cruising. And there's the views of the ocean, mountains, glaciers and an active volcano ... Homer has it goin' on! Here are some pics from Scott and Becky Hauser that show crust cruising northeast of Homer.
	Rob Whitney was in the remote Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta village of Kasigluk, Alaska recently. He went to this village 25 miles SW of Bethel for work he is doing with an environmental engineering firm. In packing for this trip Rob made sure that he brought along the essentials - his skis! Looks like Rob found some good, and very unique, spring skiing. This place looks to be safe for skiing in high winds ... no trees around to blow over on top of you!!

	Crust and Gravel Are a Good Combination: We didn't know anything about the Main Chugach Mountains Gravel Creek drainage until the day we skied there. Now we know that it is a great place for spring skiing.
	Springtime Visit to the Bergs: Photos from one of Southcentral Alaska's most popular crust skiing trips - up the Placer River Valley to the Spencer Glacier.
	A Crust Ski Into the Past : Checking out old homesteader roads in the Eagle River Valley.
	Kusko Cruising: Skiing village trails from Aniak to Bethel on the Kuskokwim River.
	Chuathbaluk - Easier to Ski To Than Pronounce: A 36 mile "truck trail" day trip on the Kuskokwim River out of Aniak.
	Taiga 'Til Yer Tired: 50 miles of swamp skating on the Trapper Lake - Rabideax Trail.
	Mark Doner sent me these two pictures and a description of a cool spring skiing trip: "We parked at Troublesome Creek (about mile 137) and skied down the creek to the Chulitna River, upstream about 4 miles to the Tokositna, then up the Tokositna to the trail east back to Mile 131 parking lot. We had a hitchhike back to the car, but I'm scheming on a better way to close the loop. It was a total of about 28 miles skiing right at the foot of the Alaska Range - very nice! The trail to mile 131 is off the north end of the Swan Lake swamp (look for a cabin on the ridge), but there is also another trail back to the road (at mi 127 I think) a little further south that could make for a little longer tour." Good one Mark !
	Chasing Beluga on Skis: Two ski trips (one recon 40 miler, one successful 60 miler) to get to Beluga, Alaska (population: 26) and back.
	A Good Possession for Skiers: Skiing to Pt. Possession, the northernmost point of the Kenai Peninsula, from Captain Cook State Park (60 mile overnighter).
	WTC and LSDA are A-OK: Skiing the Willow Trail Committee (WTC) groomed multi-use trails and Snowmo-Skiing on the Lower Susitna Drainage Area (LDSA) groomed trail that goes down the Susitna River and up the Yentna River.
	Skiing in Musherville, USA: Checking out the Talkeetna Mail Trail and Intertie area. There is a reason many big name mushers live in the Willow area ... these trails.
	Ice Roads, Mile-Long Tunnels, Forbidden Trails and Abandoned Cabins, Pictures from exploring the Lower Susitna Drainage by skis (and a bit by use of Nordic Blades).
	[2005] Give the Sport of SkiFishalon a Try: Combining cross country skiing and ice fishing (with a touch of snowmobiling), this is a good way to explore the Susitna Valley.
	[2005] Crust cruising on the South Fork of the Matanuska River: Scott Hauser and crew picked a perfect day last year to do some spring skiing in a new area. Check out his pictures to see what great spring skiing is all about!!


TK: I'm always on the hunt for new places to explore by skis in South Central Alaska. When I go to places I haven't been to before I sometimes take along a camera and try to document the ski trip to share with others. Why share these pictures? To show that "cross country" can be a fun part of cross country skiing. That's right. It seems that these days the term "cross country" is missing from many xc skier's practice of cross country skiing. Instead of using skis to ski 'across country', it seems that 95 percent of Alaskan xc skiers choose to ski in small loops around prepared tracks all winter. Skiers get a very narrow view of what xc skiing can be and what Alaska has to offer when they never leave a groomed trail, when they never leave a city trail network, when they spend year after year doing the same ski events. I like the Alaskan tourism license plate slogan of recent: "See Alaska B4UDIE". So I say to fellow Alaska XC skiers: "Ski Alaska B4UDIE" Places like the Mat-Su Borough boast over 2000 miles of multi-use winter trails. And that is a drop in the bucket when it comes to total miles of the winter trail for Alaska. Most often these winter trails are used by snowmobilers and mushers - good, outdoors loving folks that see way more of our state than the normal xc skier does. So why let snowmobiles and mushers have all the fun? Alaska's thousands of miles of winter trails can be skied too. So give it a try, stop skiing in urban loops on manicured snow carpets for a change, hit some of Alaska's great remote winter trails and put some "cross country" in your "XC". And you will See and Ski some Alaska ... B4UDIE !!

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