Snowmobile Trail Conditions Report: The Forks, Maine January 2022

THE FORKS TRAIL REPORT 1/31/2022

Harkening back to card collecting as a kid, the term “near mint” comes to mind thinking about how the trails came out last night. The type of snow, the cold temps last night, people staying off the trails after grooming, all make for a great time to ride!

We sent out three groomers last night and did our entire trail system. We opened up our favorite trail on the system, the Pleasant Pond Trail!

TRAIL notes
ITS 87 south of Caratunk is rerouted back to the normal route the last few seasons and is correct to our trail maps. This goes back to using the Chase Pond Road. The alternate route will stay open and make for a nice little loop on the southern end. We will refer to this in the future as the Moxie Mountain Loop Trail.

TRAIL GROOMING reports
ITS 87 Groomed and in excellent shape.
ITS 86 Groomed and in excellent shape.
Pleasant Pond Trail Opened, groomed and in excellent shape. There is a skinny woods section that has quite a few hangers and needs to be brushed back some more. About a mile long section. (Hint hint)
Bald Mountain Trail Groomed and in excellent shape.
Breakneck Ridge trail Groomed and in excellent shape.
Kennebec River Trail Groomed and in excellent shape.
Caratunk Spur Groomed and in excellent shape.
Moxie Falls Trail Opened and groomed.
Moxie Mountain Loop Trail Groomed (this is the old ITS 87 re-route).

Your groomer heroes last night,
The PRO, groomer Greg Caruso
The ANGLER, groomer Chris Russell
and That Lakeside Guy, Ben Towle
(also Club President and Trail Master) 🙂
Forks Area Trails Snowmobile Club
The Forks Maine Snowmobile Trail Map

Snowmobile Trail Conditions: January 28th Update

Good news, ITS 87 is open again!
Better news. BIG snow coming!
What this means for grooming… this does change our schedule. We are closely looking at this storm for start and end times. There is no point in grooming during the storm, it’s just a waste of fuel etc. So- if the storm gets over Sat night, we will send groomers out late night and work through the AM then out again Sunday night. If storm goes into the morning then we won’t be out until Sunday night.

It is helpful if sleds go out and ride the trails after the storm to pack down the trails.

Ben Towle

THE FORKS TRAIL REPORT 1/26/2022

We had two groomers out last night, doing what we can with what we have and trying not to break anything 🙂 We added the weather channel to the groomer last week and we suspect that is why we have a storm coming this weekend…

ITS 87 Groomed from Lake Moxie road to Caratunk Spur. In town definitely needs more snow. Woods sections same, need more snow but passable. Woods roads in good shape. South still dead ends at the Caratunk Spur. Trail will be opened for the weekend and will be groomed again Friday night. Continue to use Bald mountain trail to get to Bingham.
ITS 86 We groomed to the Brochu road and stopped there for the Greenville club Groomer Extraction. They did go over that remaining section with a drag after they came through. Good shape overall except in the woods sections.
Kennebec River Trail Groomed and in good shape until you get to the steep hill off the flood road. That section remains ungroomed but passable.
Caratunk Spur  Groomed and in good shape.
Moxie Falls Trail Passable but need more snow to groom.
Pleasant Pond Trail Still closed due to logging, but we are on track to open that by Feb 4th.
Bald Mountain Trail Groomed and in very good shape.
Breakneck Ridge trail Groomed and in very good shape.

We will be out again Friday night with both groomers.

Ben Towle
President and Trail Master
Forks Area Trails Snowmobile Club
The Forks Maine Snowmobile Trail Map

THE FORKS AREA TRAILS CLUB – IMPORTANT CLOSURE UPDATE

January 24, 2022
ITS 87 south will be closed from Caratunk spur south, with no outlet until this weekend due to new logging operations per Weyerhauser. We will sign from Northern Outdoors kiosk intersection and from Caratunk spur.

Only access to Bingham is to take the Bald Mountain Trail to the Austin Pond Trail (most mapping programs label that as the Windmill Trail- keep in mind there is another windmill trail in Bingham adding to the confusion).

THE FORKS TRAIL REPORT 1/19/2022

What do we want? We want to ride! When do we want to ride? We want to ride now! Can we ride now? Absolutely! It’s time to break those sleds out and get out there. Trail conditions vastly improved with the last storm. Even though we had some groomer breakdowns yesterday, we were able to still do the majority of our system. The best I can say is the system is a mix of riding right now but overall better than it should be considering the snow depth. Woods trails are thin, and the roads are really good. Use caution and treat the trails as early season conditions. The higher the elevations, the more snow.

ITS 87 Groomed and in good shape. Moore’s Bog area is thin for a couple miles, then opens up to some beautiful riding south towards Bingham. Note the reroute on old ITS 87 (marked) as maps are not accurate.
ITS 88 Groomed and in good to great shape. Powerline sections thin but overall smooth sailing towards Greenville.
Kennebec River Trail  Will be groomed today to the Flood Road. Need more snow to groom the remaining section but passable.
Caratunk Spur  Groomed and in good shape.
Moxie Falls Trail Needs more snow to groom but passable.
Pleasant Pond Trail Closed due to logging. Please stay off.
Bald Mountain Trail Will be groomed today.
 
Ben Towle
President and Trail Master
Forks Area Trails Snowmobile Club
The Forks Maine Snowmobile Trail Map

Day riders, once snow arrives, there is a FREE PARK & RIDE LOT at Northern Outdoors on Route 201.

The large parking lot is plowed with plenty of room for snowmobile trailers and groomed access to all trails. The Park & Ride lot is marked with a large sign on Route 201, 1/4 mile south of Northern Outdoors. Snowmobile trail maps, 91 octane ethanol-free gas, great food, and cold beer are available at Northern Outdoors.
**PLEASE NOTE: Gas is CASH ONLY and available 9:00am-5:00pm

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THE FORKS TRAIL UPDATE 1/17/2022

Well, not the storm any of us were expecting, receiving only about 4 inches. I expect higher elevations to have a bit more. The good part is it’s heavy and dense so will pack nice and further set the base.
We will have two groomers out tomorrow (1/18) during the day, please be aware. We will do a full trail report after.

We do have our third groomer down with locker issues and the 12k lb winch we have to have functional has also decided to die.

Please note the Pleasant Pond trail remains closed until the end of the month due to logging. Please read the signs at intersections, just because there are snowmobile and or even groomer tracks does not mean you are supposed to be there.

Ben Towle
President and Trail Master
Forks Area Trails Snowmobile Club
The Forks Maine Snowmobile Trail Map

THE FORKS TRAIL REPORT 12/21/2021

Happy holidays from The Forks Area Trails Club. I know you are looking forward to getting on the trails as much as we are! Here are some early season riding updates, trail changes and expectations.

First things first, the trails are NOT open! The last storm we did receive a couple inches and looks like a couple more on the way this week. It’s a good start but please stay off the trails. We have a lot of water holes, soft spots and need colder weather to harden everything up. Looking at the 10 day plus forecast it doesn’t look like we will be able to get out there until after the new year.

Trail changes
Some good news! We are happy to announce we will have the Pleasant Pond Trail and all of the Bald Mountain Trail open this year! The bad news which may be moot at this point, is we won’t have access until AFTER the second week of January. The trails are marked on either side of this closure. Please respect the landowners request as there is active logging going on in this area. The rest of our trail system will remain unchanged.

Our groomers have all been serviced and ready to go. As soon as the ground is frozen, and we have enough snow to pan and pack, we will be out there!

Please like and follow us on Facebook for the latest trail updates and news.

Looking ahead to next season, we need a new drag. These drags run in the $20k to $30k dollar range so we are asking to please join the club, donate to the club and participate in some of our fundraisers we will be doing this year. Every little bit helps. We will have trail donation bins at local businesses, and we will be doing a 50/50 raffle this year. Only 500 tickets will be sold at $10 dollars apiece. We will have multiple locations to purchase and more details to follow.

A HUGE shoutout to all the volunteers that helped on our system this year. New bridges, MUCH more signage and a lot of excavating trail work, widening, brushing, removing rocks and adding material.

Have a great Christmas and a Happy New Year. Maybe Santa will bring us some snow!

Ben Towle
President and Trail Master
Forks Area Trails Snowmobile Club
The Forks Maine Snowmobile Trail Map