A groomed trail xc skiing experience

We decided to try-out the groomed trails at Smiling Hill Farm as a change of pace from our usual cross country skiing adventures on the ungroomed trails. The reason we haven't tried out any groomed trails lately is because, well, it costs money and we live on a pretty tight budget. But with G.'s WinterKids passport discount (her trail pass was free and her sister's half price) the girls and I decided to splurge and compare the differences in skiing experience.

No look-outs required - the kids liked skiing next to each other (not in a line like we usually do on the Mountain Division Trail) because they didn't have to watch out for snowmobiles. They felt more relaxed to simply chit-chat and look around for animal tracks (we found lots here!). And of course we had to stop and watch the planes heading into the jetport (see video).

Grooved tracks were "cool" - The girls really enjoyed the grooved tracks for double-poling. They loved the speed of double-poling but didn't have the upper-body strength to do it for long. I personally found the tracks a little hard for regular skiing and stuck to the middle of the trail to avoid them.

Map marker woes - The trail map seemed easy enough to follow with multiple loops and paths to follow but it was a little more challenging once we were out there. The markers were few and far between with many intersections not having any. We opted to ditch the map and just ski around for a while until we got tired. And it turned out not to be that hard to find our way back; the smell of the cows/manure made choosing our direction easier (the barns are next to the ski shop) and we did find a couple of markers on the way back (the girls had quite a few comments about the "stinky cows" by the end of the day).

The dairy store - The highlight of the afternoon for the kids was getting a small ice cream cone. We all really build up a sweat cross country skiing, even on the coldest days. So an ice cream after a trail run isn't so strange a choice for us.

Mom's two-cents - I agreed with the kids that the groomed trails had a lot of great features but explained to them it was not something we could do with frequency because of the cost (which will always include the ice cream because we can not pass the dairy store without stopping for our favorite treat). But we do hope to make another visit before the snow season is over.

The kids really liked the grooved tracks and did quite a bit of double-poling, something they hadn't done much of on other trails.

We see deer tracks often enough in our own backyard and on other trails...

... but the wild turkey tracks were an exciting new discovery for the kids.

The trail markers were small and infrequent but we did find a few, enough to lead us back to the trailhead when we decided to leave.

Eating an ice cream cone outside in February isn't all that strange after an afternoon of cross country skiing.