The Skiing Dudes

The Skiing Dudes meet every Tuesday for a few hours of X country skiing & fellowship on sections of the 35 km of groomed trails at the Kawartha Nordic Ski Club (KNSC). Skiers from Peterborough will meet at 9:30 in the Riverview Zoo parking lot in order to carpool. We will meet Dudes driving from surrounding areas at approximately 10:15 in the KNSC parking lot. Following the skiing we will have lunch at Honeys Diner in Big Cedar a 10 minute drive south on Hgw 28. KNSC has a website http://www.kawarthanordic.ca/ on which there are directions for driving to the club, trail maps, updates on the current trail conditions, & club memberships. For non members the daily fee is $15 ( by honour system). The Skiing Dudes were formed by members of the Cycling Dudes http://cyclingdudes.blogspot.com/ who felt that they would like to continue the concept of a weekly outing during the ski season.

March 17 2009

Barry Diceman, Keith Buchanan & Peter Hamley skiied today in warm spring conditions under clear skies & a temperature of 10 C. This was the last day of skiing for the Dudes this winter. Peter took these photos of Barry in his spring ski outfit & Keith in his ski patrol gear ready to treat Barry for either hypothermia or sunstroke! Honey's Diner had a St Patrick's Day special, beef marinated in Guiness beer.

Sunday Feb 1 2009 a Lone Dude Ski Tour

Today I skied an 18 km loop featuring some of the best trails at KNSC. Conditions were ideal, sun & blue skies for the ski on PL & Kawartha with a good firm snow base on the trails even though the temperature was around the freezing mark. I started on Beaver, skiing to Kenner, then up Kenner to the Tanney cabin. From Tanney continued up Kenner to the PL Road. Barry had introduced me to PL which is one of my favourite areas featuring rolling terrain with a mature coniferous forest consisting of tall white pines, spruce, & cedar groves. The bottom 3 photos were taken on PL, the hut like structure,on Kawartha, is an old feeding rack that was built in the 1980's into which bales of hay were placed to feed the resident deer herd. This area is slated for logging later this year so try to ski it this season as there will be a dramatic change after the logging operations are completed. Met Keith Buchanan in the Chalet & had a chat with Mike Peterman who might join us on Tuesday. Left click on photos to enlarge.

Frank's & Pete's Photos from Dudes Ski Tues Jan 20 2009

The skier in the blue racing suit in the middle photo is Brian Hedney who is a retired teacher from TCS & an avid cyclist & skier. I found the Ganaraska Hills route that we cycle each season, from Garden Hill, on his cycling website where the terrain is described as relatively flat! The photo was taken outside the Laderach Cabin. From the bottom, photos 1,2,& 4 are on Kenner,#5 is at the junction of Deer & Kawartha & #6 is of Frank's boots that are ready for burial in the Laderach boot camp.

Sat Jan 17 2009

Barry Diceman & I skied a loop of 15 km today. We went up Kawartha to Wolf, Wolf to Kenner then stopped at Tanney Cabin for a rest & lit the wood stove,1st photo. From Tanney we skied with Keith MacKenzie on the PL Rd, 2nd photo, which is a lovely trail thru a mature pine forest with nice downhill sections to Kawartha & back to the parking lot. Note Keith hugging a tree that will be logged this fall & the kids in the Jack Rabbit ski class, future Dudes & Babes! Keith plans to join the Dudes when he gets around to retiring. The temp was cold, -18 C when we started but we stayed warm & dry, although our drinks had turned to slush near the end of the day!