Florence/Florence County, WI
- Thread starter Snowaddict
- Start date
Agree with all that cabin800! Makes it very, very difficult for the Groomers to be able to groom back into a solid base snow trail! This is due to the tires digging, rutting, and trenching out, the existing groom. Very sad as some of the places we have dumped, are such nice areas to snowmobile. We won't even stop there for fuel, eats, or anything else for that matter. No more $$$ for those areas!
My place is a couple of miles from dfattack in Spread Eagle and been riding there for 15 or so years and don't recall ever seeing one ute or atv on trail, seen a few ruts a couple of times near the flowage made by ice fishermen, even seen tracks made by 4x4 trucks. Same with Dungood, I think they allow them, but never seen one.
dfattack
Well-known member
We headed north up trail 5 today and then east to felch and encountered about 8 people on horseback! I've never seen that before. We stopped and shut off the engines since one of the horses was freaked out by the sleds. They were nice people and thanked us for helping out. Accident waiting to happen in my opinion. At least we were just pulling up to a stop sign at a road crossing. Can't imagine what would happen in a tight corner. We have ice right underneath the snow and if you don't have studs (which I don't) that wouldn't be a good thing.
BTW...I was on Tri-County trails today and the trails need snow bad. Florence (Blue OX) had the best trail conditions so far.
BTW...I was on Tri-County trails today and the trails need snow bad. Florence (Blue OX) had the best trail conditions so far.
I have found the farther north you go in Florence County utv/atvs aren't as bad, but if you ride from Dunbar to Northwoods bar to Athelstane over to Silver Cliff, pipe line back to Goodman on a Saturday you will see a bunch, Dungood and Iron Shoe do a great job, Near North are the absolute worst. Starting to get bad around Caldron falls and High falls flowages too, only takes 2or3 utvs sliding around spinning there wheels and trails are all rutted up and that's the way I have seen most of them drive, a new one I seen this weekend a guy on a fat tire bike on narrow part of the trail north of Trout Haven Rd cant see anything bad happening there.
Snowaddict
Member
Our main ride in Florence will be this Friday. Saturday will probably end out hanging out of Fisher lake with some friends, whom will be doing some ice fishing with their kids and others. We're staying at the Lakeside B&B. Was hoping to get some snow before then, as from some of the above reports more is needed. The local forecast seems to be downgrading the event for tomorrow, compared to John's previous forecast. Still hoping he's more accurate. The County office was nice enough to send me a trail map. So, will have to take a look at that and the reports above to figure out where to plan to go while it's still decent. I'm assuming the atv ride event mentioned previously is on Sat. So, maybe that won't be a factor Fri.
Stay in northern Florence County and you should be fine always like the trail towards Long Lake/Tipler, I think the ride starts on Friday don't how many are there Friday the main event is on Saturday
goofy600
Well-known member
df how are the new rides so far?
my thoughts exactly, but I had heard he hadn't tried the Mach yet! stronger will than I would have!
dfattack
Well-known member
Well, my first day out was a last minute decision and so I hadn't moved my stuff over to the Mach yet. I decided to take out the old sled (2012 Apex XTX) on the first day. That's when I headed over to tipler, down to Goodman then back up to Spread Eagle to the chuckwagon.
Went out yesterday with a friend of mine from town (Iron Mountain) who ironically was taking his Mach out for it's first ride. I will be honest, my first impression was mixed. Love the rear suspension on the Mach but man do I miss the power steering on the Apex. I had the Dealer put a set of snow trackers on the Mach before I even picked it up and was thinking the steering was heavy due to the ST's. Since I had a bone stock Mach along for the ride we switched and basically had the same feeling on his. It's funny, my friend thought my machine had lighter steering than his. Go figure. I've been on Yamaha's since I was kid in 1983. Spent most of the day yesterday just building confidence on the different seating position and getting to know the machine. Kinda like when getting a new car. Apprehensive at first...at least for me. As the day went on I was liking it more and more except for the heavy steering. I think I rode 115 ish miles yesterday but it felt double that. The trails were thin and icy in some places so I guess not completely fair but it is what it is. I've been exchanging private messages with a well known guy on dootalk about the heavy steering and other things and he agreed that for guys like me who are used to the EPS on the Yamahas...it's an adjustment. On the plus side I feel like I worked on my shoulders and biceps yesterday. Man am I sore today.
I would say the smart shox definitely work as advertised. I was playing with the different settings and can report you do notice the difference. So far I'm happy with the purchase but just need to get used to the new sled. Don't want to make the post too long so if you have any questions let me know.
Grand Touring hasn't come in yet. Was supposed to be January delivery but it hasn't even shipped yet.
Went out yesterday with a friend of mine from town (Iron Mountain) who ironically was taking his Mach out for it's first ride. I will be honest, my first impression was mixed. Love the rear suspension on the Mach but man do I miss the power steering on the Apex. I had the Dealer put a set of snow trackers on the Mach before I even picked it up and was thinking the steering was heavy due to the ST's. Since I had a bone stock Mach along for the ride we switched and basically had the same feeling on his. It's funny, my friend thought my machine had lighter steering than his. Go figure. I've been on Yamaha's since I was kid in 1983. Spent most of the day yesterday just building confidence on the different seating position and getting to know the machine. Kinda like when getting a new car. Apprehensive at first...at least for me. As the day went on I was liking it more and more except for the heavy steering. I think I rode 115 ish miles yesterday but it felt double that. The trails were thin and icy in some places so I guess not completely fair but it is what it is. I've been exchanging private messages with a well known guy on dootalk about the heavy steering and other things and he agreed that for guys like me who are used to the EPS on the Yamahas...it's an adjustment. On the plus side I feel like I worked on my shoulders and biceps yesterday. Man am I sore today.
I would say the smart shox definitely work as advertised. I was playing with the different settings and can report you do notice the difference. So far I'm happy with the purchase but just need to get used to the new sled. Don't want to make the post too long so if you have any questions let me know.
Grand Touring hasn't come in yet. Was supposed to be January delivery but it hasn't even shipped yet.
dfattack
Well-known member
you coming up to ride soon?
We won't be going there! No$$$$
dfattack
Well-known member
Rode yesterday from spread eagle and did a loop similar to last week. The 3-4” of snow we received the other day made good trail conditions just about the best you could ask for. Anyone thinking about riding in this area will be very happy. Only passed one group yesterday while on 100 mile day.
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Snowaddict
Member
Hats off to the Blue Ox club. We had amazing riding over the weekend. Also, thanks to dfattack for good info. Our accommodations were absolutely amazing as well. Shout out to Lakeside Bed & Breakfast. Bill and Stacey were wonderful hosts and had awesome food. The only areas that lacked snow were in logging areas, which is to be expected. I was not familiar with this area before. I will not hesitate to go back. As far as the worry about ATV/UTVs, we never ran into any. Matter of fact, we didn't really run into many other sleds overall.