Tent in the woods

We had an after lunch ride today. We headed out to the office in the woods.

The wind was blowing and it was snowing lightly. I ran with my visor down a littl etoo long, it fogged up and froze, so I rode with it open and froze my eyelashes together.

The other folks on the trip were from CRTC, the Cold Regions Test Center, here on Greely. They get issued bunny boots, Carhartt insulated coveralls, killer gloves, a fleece balaclava and a ton of handwarmers. Lucky dogs. All the good gear on Sammy's nickel.

We cruised for about an hour and ended up at the tent in the woods.

The tent is apparantly the second office. Almost no one knows where it is. It's right around where an old bear hunting camp used to sit.

It even has a spacious outhouse. Probably not the warmest place to drop trou.

We fired up the woodstove, got out of the wind, and the laughter started right away. Shortly before we got here, one of the guys took a corner a bit close and hit a tree. Since these guys all work together they were razzing him pretty hard. Cell phones worked up here too, the young lady in the picture got a call from work. Damn that technology.

Ah, warmth and hot chocolate. I defrosted my helmet by the fire. Thes second half of hte ride was a blast, I could actually see where I was going with my visor down.

Here is the CRTC crew outside the tent.

Still squinty. Notice the mittens are attached.

Here's a shot of the trail ahead of me. Pretty stuff. The snow was so light and fluffy. Pure powder. Makes the snowmachine slide all over the place. I stepped off the trail at one point and sunk up past my knees.

Here's the crew on the trail, waiting for the tail end to catch up.

It was a blast just cruising through the timber. We hit the frozen river at one point and were up to like 60-65mph. Just flying.